TWENTY  YEARS  IN    PARIS 


Photo  by  Gersflttl,  Paris. 


FJikUINAND    DE    LESSEPS. 


TWENTY  YEARS  IN  PARIS 

BEING  SOME  RECOLLECTIONS 
OF  A  LITERARY  LIFE 


BY 

ROBERT     HARBOROUGH     SHERARD 


WITH    8    ILLUSTRATIONS 


I'lIILADELPHIA 

GEORGE   W.   JACOBS   &   CO. 

PUBLISHERS 


PRINTUn    IN    OKF.AI     HRITAIN 


TO 

MY     GOOD     FRIEND 

BEN    WALMSLEY,    OF    BOWDON, 

THIS     BOOK     IS 
DEDICATED 


PREFATORY  NOTE 

ALTHOUGH,  in  the  writing  of  it,  this  book  has 
grown  to  a  bulk  which  much  surpasses  that  which 
was  proposed  at  the  outset,  and  although  at  all  times  that 
precept  was  kept  in  mind  by  which  the  severe  Boileau 
proclaims  it  the  great  art  of  authorship  to  leave  certain 
things  unsaid,  I  am  yet  conscious  as  I  read  lits  pages 
over  again  that  many  people  have  been  left  unnamed 
who  ought  to  have  been  named,  and  that  many  things 
have  not  been  told  which  ought  to  have  been  told.  I 
begin  now  to  understand  why  it  is  that  the  writers  of 
memoirs  usually  require  several  volumes  for  their  nar- 
ratives, and  I  can  appreciate  the  truth  of  those  words  of 
the  poet  Baudelaire  which  Alphonse  Daudet  used  often 
to  quote  in  my  hearing,  "  J'ai  plus  de  souvenirs  que  si 
j'avais  mille  ans." 

The  purpose  of  this  explanatory  note  is  to  pay  a 
collective  tribute  to  those  still  living  and  to  the  memory 
of  those  who  are  dead,  whose  names  are  not  recorded  in 
friendship  in  these  pages.  To  have  written  about  all  the 
distinguished  people  who  by  the  privilege  of  their  com- 
panionship and  the  graciousness  of  their  hospitality  have 
embellished  the  twenty  years  of  my  life  in  Paris  would 
indeed  have    necessitated  a  record    of  many     volumes. 


viii  PRFFA  rc^RV    NOTE 

For  these  Parisians  are  a  great  people  who,  in  their 
carriage  towards  such  strangers  as  know  how  to  win 
their  confidence,  display  an  urbanity  which  indeed  entitles 
them  to  claim  for  their  city  what  Victor  Hugo  claimed, 
that   it  is  the  metropolis  of  the  civilized  world. 

ROBERT  H.  SHERARD. 


22,  Rue  Grevarix,  Vernon,  (Eure),  France. 
August  26,  1905. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER    I 

PAGE 

Victor  Hugo — The  Poet's  Orchard — Senat  and  his  Collars — Hauteville 
House — The  Ghost's  Chair — Victor  Hugo  en  deshabille — His  Last 
Years  in  Paris — Hero-Worship — The  Poet  and  his  Circle — Oscar 
Wilde  and  Victor  Hugo — Victor  Hugo  and  the  Kings — His  Last 
Autograph — His  Public  Testament i 

CHAPTER   II 

Crime  and  Punishment  in  France — The  Leniency  Displayed — The 
Sentimentality  of  the  French  Jury — Women  and  the  Law — The 
Last  Execution  of  a  Woman  in  France — Enghsh  and  French 
Judges  Compared — Maitre  Henri  Robert  and  his  Client — Joseph 
Aubert  the  Murderer — His  Gascon  Imagination — My  Dealings 
with  him— Aubert  as  a  Postage-Stamp  Collector— Aubert  and 
the  Insurance  Clerk — The  Stamp-Collector  at  Work     .         .        .16 

CHAPTER    III 

A  Murderer's  Kindness  to  Animals— Aubert  at  the  Bull-fight— The 
Killing  of  Delahaef — "  The  Ayenbite  of  Inwyt" — Aubert's  Trial — A 
Letter  from  the  lies  du  Salut — The  Guiana  Convict  Settlement — 
The  Devil's  Island  as  an  Earthly  Paradise — French  Presidents 
and  the  Death  Penalty — Executions  in  Paris — The  Court  of 
Appeal  and  its  Limitations — A  Two-Edged  Sword — The  Case 
of  Madame  Groetzinger 35 

CHAPTER    IV 

Alexandre  Dumas  F//^— Below  Stairs  in  the  Avenue  de  Villiers — Jean 
Richepin — "  La  Dame  aux  Camelias  " — Flaubert  and  "  Madame 
Bovary" — Guy  de  Maupassant — His  Contempt  for  Literature  — His 
Adulation  of  "  Society  " — Pessimism  and  Pessimists — The  Norman 
Peasants — The  Doctor  and  his  Patient — De  Maupassant's  Illness — 
Dr.  Blanche — His  Absent-mindedness — De  Maupassant's  End       .     52 


X  CONTENTS 

CHAI'TKR    V 

rAClE 

Dumas  fih  and  Dumas  p^rc — Dumas  fils  and  Jules  \'eine — His 
Curiosity  about  Modern  Paris — The  Little  Old  Woman  on  Two 
Sticks — Marguerite  Licnard  at  Home — A  Midnight  Conversation — 
The  Observations  of  a  Professional  Bcyyar — Her  Long  Career — 
The  Two  Communards,  Father  and  Son — Those  that  Disappear — 
The  Dead  who  walk  again 66 


CHAPTER   VI 

The  Modern  "Cour  des  Miracles" — Bibi-la-Puree — A  Survivor  of  the 
Middle  Ages — His  Mode  of  Life — His  Friendship  for  Verlaine  — 
His  Last  Impersonations— The  Old  Pole— A  King  Lear  of  the 
Gutter— The  Adventures  of  Fenine — "  La  Revendication  Indi- 
viduelle  " — Our  Last  Tryst — An  Englishman  in  Paris — A  Har- 
boured Resentment — The  Lady  who  called So 


CHAPTER   VII 

Baron  Haussmann — His  Home,  Rue  Boissy  d'Anglas — A  Pen-Portrait — 
The  Writing  of  his  Memoirs — His  Acknowledgment  of  Napoleon's 
Share  in  his  W'ork — His  Opposition  to  the  Franco-Prussian  War — 
Bismarck's  Rude  Reception  at  Biarritz — The  Real  Cause  of  the 
War — Haussmann's  Political  Opinions — The  Story  of  his  Career — 
His  Last  Words— Paul  Deroul^de  and  "  La  Revanche  "—Old  Paris  102 


CHAPTER   VIII 

Ferdinand  de  Lesseps — On  the  Science  of  Antechambering — A  Meeting 
of  the  Council — His  Entire  Confidence— Countess  Kessler's  Dinner 
Party — An  Introduction  to  Magnard — De  Lesseps  to  the  Rescue — 
De  Lesseps  and  the  Poor  Woman — The  Report  of  his  Death — A 
Stock-jobbing  Manoeuvre — A  Drive  to  the  Institute         ,        .         .121 


CHAPTER    IX 

Ferdinand  de  Lesseps — Three  Years  Later — How  he  heard  of  the 
Prosecution — His  Resignation — His  Wife's  Courage — Widespread 
Sympathy — An  Emperor's  Letter — The  Family's  Losses— His  Faith 
in  Panama — His  Dislike  of  Speculation 137 


CONTENTS  xi 

CHAPTER   X 

PACE 

After  the  Debdcle — A  Visit  to  La  Chesnaye — A  House  of  Mourning — 
How  De  Lesseps  and  his  Family  were  beloved — The  Lesseps 
Children  and  their  Stepbrother  Charles — Ferdinand  de  Lesseps 
portrayed — Renan's  Tribute — Friends  in  Adversity— The  Family 
at  Luncheon — De  Lesseps'  Hope  in  Queen  Victoria — My  Last 
View  of  the  Great  Frenchman 146 

CHAPTER   XI 

Monsieur  Eiffel — Meetings  with  him  in  Elevated  Spheres — His  Visit  to 
England — "A  Magnificent  Experience" — A  Tribute  to  English 
Railways — The  Firth  of  Forth  Bridge — The  Prince  and  the 
Engineer — The  Eloquence  of  the  Weather — "The  Ascertained 
Average  " — "  Per  ^^40,000  Life  "— "  The  Most  Remarkable  Con- 
struction, bar  none  " — Edison  and  Eiffel — Eiffel's  Modesty      .         .  165 

CHAPTER   XH 

Thomas  Alva  Edison — How  I  made  his  Acquaintance — A  Characteristic 
Letter — The  King's  Envoye— Count  and  Countess  Edison — Edison's 
Opinion  on  Paris — A  Dejeuner  on  the  Eiffel  Tower — The  Simplicity 
of  a  Great  Man— Edison  on  Electrocution — "What  is  Electricity, 
after  all?" — Edison  and  Mr.  Gladstone — His  Opinion  on  Eiffel, 
President  Camot,  and  Prime  Minister  Tirard        .        .         .         .174 

CHAPTER   XHI 

On  Electrocution — Edison's  Disapproval  prompts  a  Close  Inquiry — 
Unanimous  Condemnation  by  Leading  Scientists — The  Execu- 
tioner's View— Monsieur  de  Boer,  Editor  oiUEleciricite — Monsieur 
Joubert's  Experiments — Monsieur  Cornu — "  Science  has  no  Place 
in  the  Shambles" — The  Greatest  Physiologist — Doctor  d'Arsonval 
■ — A  Scathing  Denunciation — "  Impracticable,  Illogical,  and  Un- 
certain "—Death  only  Apparent — Electrical  Asphyxia  a  Hideous 
Torture — Dr.  Brown-Sequard's  Opinion — Unanimous  Accordance 
of  German  Scientists — American  Indifference — How  I  missed 
Fame  and  Fortune .        .         .         -193 

CHAPTER   XIV 

Ernest  Renan — On  Future  Punishment — The  Genesis  of  the  Idea — Its 
Development — The  Belief  of  the  Romans — The  Inferno  of  the 
Buddhists— Ernest  Renan  as  a  Man — His  Home  in  the  College  de 
France — A  Man  of  Many  Books — His  Opinion  on  the  Naturalists — 
Renan  and  Daudet 204 


xH  CONTENTS 

PACE 

Louise  Muhcl  -My  First  Si^jht  of  Her  -A  Catherine,'  of  Anarchists— 
The  Police  Spies— Fcrr>'  and  Aubertin— A  Stolen  Interview — 
Louise  Michel's  Appearance — Her  Noble  Character — My  last 
Meeting  with  Her  -Why  She  Refusetl  Her  Hlcssinj^  A  Socialist 
at  the  Elyst'c— The  Dress-Coat  and  the  Scent— Jules  Jouy      .         .  218 


CHAPTER   XVI 

The  Captains  and  the  Kings — As  Subjects  for  Journalism—"  Carnot  at 
the  Elysce  " — A  Geographical  Hotel — Dom  Francis  and  his  Dogs— 
"  Envoyez  Schneider" — Dom  Pedro  of  Brazil — A  Night  Out  with 
a  King — Alexander  of  Servia— Leopold  of  Belgium — Oscar  of 
Sweden — Macmahon  in  the  Lock-up — Carnot  and  the  Kangaroo — 
Adrien  Marie — Queen  Victoria's  Kindness — Prince  Dhuleep  Singh 
— The  Duchesse  d'Uzes — General  Boulanger 335 


CHAPTER   XVII 

President  Carnot— A  Garden  Party  at  Fontainebleau — A  Reception  at 
the  Elysee— A  First  Glimpse  at  Loubet — James  G.  Blaine — A 
Conversation  at  the  Hotel  Binda — Blaine  on  Various  Subjects — 
The  Statesman  and  his  Shadow  —  American  Politicians  —  A 
Presidential  Shooting  Party — Carnot's  First  Cabinet — Carnot's 
Assassination— A  Card  from  Casimir-Perier — Henri  d'Orleans  and 
Esterhazy — The  Marquis  de  Flers  and  Comte  d'Herisson — On 
Paying  Members  of  Parliament — General  Boulanger    .         .         .  256 


CHAPTER   XVIII 

General  Boulanger — His  Love  of  Legality — The  Duel  with  Floquet — 
The  Cause  of  his  Flight — A  Newspaper  "Beat" — the  Marquis  de 
Mores — His  Quarrel  with  Constans — His  Duel  with  Camille  Dreyfus 
— A  Trio  of  Princes — Married  yet  Single — Prince  Murat  and  the 
Heiress — The  Tailor's  Widow  and  her  Second  Husband — A  Prince 
amongst  Cooks — The  Gastronomical  Director — General  Tcheng- 
Ki-Tong — How  he  was  lured  back  to  China — A  Sinister  Suggestion 
— How  a  Reputation  was  Made 284 


CONTENTS  xiii 

CHAPTER   XIX 

PAGE 

The  Foreign  Correspondent — "  News,  not  Soul-throb  " — Yellow  Jour- 
nalism—A Cable  from  Keats — The  Fascination  of  the  Work — The 
Precariousness  of  Position — On  collecting  "  Personals  " — Shadow- 
ing a  Millionaire — Jules  Verne  and  Nelly  Ely — My  Friendship  with 
Jules  Verne — The  Paris  Correspondent  to  English  Papers — The 
Fight  against  Anonymity— The  Jealousy  of  Colleagues— A  Remon- 
strance with  Zola — American  and  English  Correspondence  Con- 
trasted— Wanted,  the  Power  of  Prophecy — How  I  missed  a  High 
Honour 305 


CHAPTER   XX 

Coquelin  Cadet — Auguste  Maquet — The  "  Ghost  "  of  Alexandre  Dumas 
— Why  Bonvin  Starved — Coquelin's  Mother — Behind  the  Scenes 
at  the  Comedie  Francaise — Mademoiselle  Reichemberg — Jules 
Claretie — Sardou— Sarah  Bernhardt  and  the  Cat — Jules  Lemaitre 
and  George  Ohnet — Massenet — The  Two  Mounets — Coquelin  the 
Elder — Parisian  Painters— Melba's  Debuts  in  Paris — Whistler        .  324 


CHAPTER   XXI 

Journalism  in  France — Contrasted  with  Journalism  in  England — Black- 
mailers— How  a  Provincial  Journal  was  Founded— A  Fighting 
Editor — "  Les  Feuilles  Soumises  " — Editing  Provincial  Journals — 
Charles  Baudelaire  as  an  Editor — The  French  Newspaper-reader — 
Serial  Stories — The  Masters  of  the  Art — Drawing  Pay — The  Editor 
oi  Le  Figaro — The  Circulations  Over  a  Million — And  Under  Five 
Hundred — How  Dead  Papers  are  kept  Alive— Some  Able  Editors — 
Aurelien  Scholl — Henri  Rochefort 350 


CHAPTER   XXII 

The  Quartier  Latin— A  Hopeless  Mode  of  Existence — Victor  Con- 
siderant — Jean  Moreas — His  Duel  with  Darzens — The  Poet  and  the 
Washerwoman — The  Fate  of  Maurice  Rollinat — Rene  Leclerc — 
Verlaine  and  Bibi-la-Puree— Laurent  Tailhade— A  Successful 
Phrase — Marcel  Schwob  and  Hugues  Rebell — Stephane  Mallarme 
— A  Matrimonial  Proposal — W.  T.  Peters — Stuart  Merrill— Raoul 
Ponchon — Those  who  have  Resisted— Paul  Adam — Henri  de 
Regnier — Maurice  Barres — Pierre  Louys— The  Writing  of  "Aphro- 
dite " — The  Regret  of  an  Ac^idemician ^yj 


xiv  CONTENTS 

CHAl'TKK    XXIII 

PAOB 

Emrst  Dowson— And  the  Moralists— The  Catastrophe  of  his  Life— His 
Pursuit  of  Pain  \V\\y  he  came  to  me  in  Paris— How  I  First 
met  him— The  Poet  and  the  Guardsman— His  Dehght  in  Sclf- 
Abascment~The  Pathetic  Promptings  of  Instinct— How  I  found 
him  in  London — He  comes  Home  with  me— The  Distress  of  Two 
Poets — Ernest  Dowson's  Last  Days — How  Relief  came  to  One 
Poet— The  Coroner's  Officer — "No  Reasonable  Cause'" — His 
Obsequies 397 

CHAPTER    XXIV 

Oscar  Wilde — His  Kindness  to  Ernest  Dowson — My  Friendship  with 
him— The  Story  of  my  Book — Subjective  or  Objective? — What 
crawled  between  us — De  Piofioidis — The  Implacability  of  Wilde's 
Enemies — The  Obvious  Sincerity  of  his  Prison  Book — Outward 
Evidence  of  this  Sincerity — His  Kindness  to  his  Fellow-Prisoners — 
A  Pupil  in  French 412 

CHAPTER  XXV 

Oscar  Wilde  in  Prison — Two  Years'  Hard  Labour — Wandsworth  Gaol 

—  His  Removal  to  Reading — His  Illness — His  Subsequent  Treat- 
ment— How  De  Pro/undis  was  Written — In  the  Exercise  Yard — 
His  Sympathy  with  his  Fellow-Sufiferers — His  Fears  for  the  Future 

—  His  Departure  from  Reading — Conversations  in  Prison — "Read 
Carlyle" 424 

CHAPTER  XXVI 

Why  Oscar  Wilde  returned  to  Former  Friends — His  Last  Years  in 
Paris — "  Deaths  are  Apt  to  be  Tragic  " — Ernest  La  Jeunesse — His 
Magnificent  Essay  on  Oscar  Wilde — A  Picture  of  the  Poet  in  his 
Last  Days — His  Death  and  Funeral — My  First  Visit  to  His  Grave 
— His  Landlord's  Story — Bagneux  revisited — The  Traffic  in  his 
Name — Literary  Forgeries 436 

CHAPTER   XXVII 

Emile  Zola  and  Oscar  Wilde — Zola's  Extreme  Reserve — A  Few  Facts 
of  Literary  History' — The  Pro-Zola  Campaign — Vizetelly's  Naive 
Admission — Zola  asks  Advice  about  going  to  London — "  Sic  Vos 
non  Vobis  " — The  Dreyfus  Affair — The  Story  of  an  Interview — The 
Zola  Trial — His  Resentment  against  me — Our  Final  Meeting — My 
Collaboration  with  Daudet — "  My  First  Voyage  " — Two  Strange 
Callers— How  we  Parted— At  Daudet's  Door— The  End         .        .  463 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


Ferdinand  de  Lesseps 
Guy  de  Maupassant  . 
Alexandre  Dumas  fils 
Baron  Haussmann 
Comtesse  de  Lesseps  . 
M.  Coquelin,  cadet   . 
Madame  Adam 
Stephane  Mallarme  . 


.Frontispiece 

FACING   PAGE 

56 


66 
104 
140 
324 
374 
390 


FACSIMILE  LETTERS 


Joseph  Aubert 
T.  A.  Edison 


PAGE 
31 


TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 


CHAPTER    I 

Victor  Hugo— The  Poet's  Orchard— Senat  and  his  Collars— Hauteville 
House — The  Ghost's  Chair — Victor  Hugo  en  deshabille— H'xs  Last 
Years  in  Paris — Hero-Worship — The  Poet  and  his  Circle — Oscar 
Wilde  and  Victor  Hugo— Victor  Hugo  and  the  Kings — His  Last 
Autograph— His  Public  Testament. 

IT  was  my  good  fortune  when,  about  twenty  years 
ago,  I  went  to  Paris  to  reside  there  permanently, 
to  have  the  entrde  of  Victor  Hugo's  house,  and  during 
the  last  period  of  his  life  I  saw  much  of  that  great  man. 
At  that  time  this  was  to  me  a  matter  of  self-felicitation. 
I  still  most  fervently  admired  the  pseudo-charities  of 
Les  Misdrables,  and  shared  with  the  large  majority  of 
my  contemporaries  an  exalted  enthusiasm  for  the  poetry 
of  the  great  Romanticist. 

My  introduction  to  the  author  of  Les  Mis^rables 
dated  from  many  years  previously,  when,  as  a  boy,  I 
lived  with  my  parents  in  the  house  adjoining  Hauteville 
House  in  Guernsey.  Our  gardens,  as  our  houses,  were 
contiguous,  and  when  I  have  added  that  the  poet's 
orchard  boasted  a  remarkably  fine  plum-tree,  famed 
throughout  the  island  for  the  size  and  flavour  of  its 
mirabelle  plums,  I  need  hardly  expatiate  ft.rther  on 
the  nature  of  my  earliest  relations  with  our  illustrious 
neighbour.       I    shall   always    regret  that,    detected    one 

I 


3  TWKXTV    VKARS    IX    PARIS 

day  by  \'iclor  Ilui^o  in  the  very  act  of  larcenous  trespass, 
I  look  to  guilty  and  precipitate  tlight,  too  preoccupied, 
indeed,  for  my  immediate  safety  even  to  listen  to  the 
remarks  which  were  addressed  to  me.  It  has  often 
since  occurred  to  me  that  had  I  allowed  myself  to  be 
impounded  by  the  benevolent  old  gentleman,  I  should 
have  enjoyed  an  address  resembling  in  eloquence  and 
picturesqueness  of  imagery  the  one  which  on  a  some- 
what similar  occasion  was  delivered  by  Jean  \'aljean  to 
the  youthful  tootpad.  For  the  rest,  the  delinquency  was 
never  reported,  and  when  a  few  days  later  I  was  allowed 
to  shake  the  poet's  hand,  no  reference  to  it  was  made. 
It  was  the  greyhound  Senat  that  procured  for  me  the 
distinguished  honour  to  which  I  refer.  This  was  Victor 
Hugo's  favourite  pet.  He  had  called  it  Senat  in  derision 
of  the  Upper  Chamber  under  the  Empire,  and  on  its 
collar  were  inscribed  some  lines  beginning  : 

Mon  nom,  Senat, 
Mon  maitre,  Hugo. 

Such  collars,  as  relics  and  souvenirs,  were  much 
prized  by  tourists,  and  the  consequence  was  that  the 
loafers  of  St.  Peter's  Port  were  always  on  the  look-out 
for  the  dog's  appearance  on  Hauteville.  Madame 
Chenais,  Victor  Hugo's  relative  and  housekeeper,  spent 
much  of  her  time  charorinsr  down  the  hill,  with  brandished 
umbrella,  to  the  rescue  of  Senat  and  his  collar.  On  one 
occasion,  by  cutting  off  the  retreat  of  the  enemy  as  I 
returned  up  hill  from  school,  I  was  able  to  render  her 
strategical  service,  and  in  reward  for  this  she  introduced 
me  to  the  poet,  who  had  come  up  while  she  was  thanking 
me.  He  was  carr)'ing  a  bunch  of  violets,  which  he 
presented  to  me  with  many  kind  words.  What  these 
words  were  I  have  forgotten,  for  with  the  guilt  on  my 


THE   GHOST   AND    HIS   CHAIR  3 

conscience  my  embarrassment  was  such  that  I  barely 
listened  to  words  which  I  would  now  give  much  to  recall. 
However,  one  thing  that  he  said  was  that  as  I  had 
saved  Senat's  collar,  in  recompense  I  should  see  where 
Senat  and,  "  in  parenthesis,"  his  master  lived  ;  and  that 
same  afternoon,  under  Madame  Chenais's  guidance,  I 
was  admitted  to  view  the  wonders  of  Hauteville  House. 

The  large  sculptured  oak  chair  which  stood  in  the 
entrance-hall  was  what  was  most  likely  to  appeal  to  a 
boy's  imagination.  From  arm  to  arm  a  spiked  chain 
was  padlocked. 

"It  is  the  master's  belief,"  I  was  told,  "  that  every 
night  the  spirit  of  one  of  his  ancestors  comes  and  seats 
himself  in  that  chair.  That  chain  is  placed  there  to 
prevent  people  from  a  profane  use  of  the  seat." 

"But  the  spirit?"   I  began. 

"  Oh,  the  padlocks  are  unfastened  ever)'  night. 
That  is  the  master's  orders,  though  it  is  our  opinion 
that  a  ghost  is  not  sufficiently  ^^o^e  to  be  hurt  by 
the  spikes." 

I  fancy  that  I  was  further  told  that  this  ancestor 
was  the  one  whose  name  was  not  inscribed  on  the 
Arc  de  Triomphe,  and  that  it  was  this  slight  that 
prompted  his  nocturnal  meanderings. 

Chairs  seemed  to  play  an  important  part  in  the 
curiosities  of  Hauteville  House.  In  the  dining-room 
one's  attention  was  called  to  three  chairs  of  graduated 
sizes,  the  Great  Chair,  the  Little  Chair,  and  the  Middle 
Chair,  on  the  backs  of  which  the  poet  had  picked  out 
in  copper-headed  nails  the  words,  "  Pater,"  "  Mater," 
"  Filius." 

This  room  was  decorated  with  many  of  the  poet's 
wonderful  pen-and-ink  drawings.  "If  Hugo  had  never 
written  a  line,"  said  Auguste  V'acquerie  once  to  me  as 


4  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

he  was  showinp^  nie  some  of  the  poet's  fantastic  sketches, 
"  there  was  tame,   if  not  immortahty,  for  him  here." 

But  perhaps  the  most  interesting  part  of  the  liouse 
wiis  the  belvedere  on  the  roof,  where  in  tlie  fine  weather 
Victor  Hui^o  used  to  work.  The  view  over  the  gardens, 
right  out  to  the  sea,  was  a  splendid  one.  "  But  when 
the  master  is  working,"  I  was  told,  "  he  never  sees  that." 
I  think  that  that  was  the  first  time  that  it  was  impressed 
upon  me  that  artists  do  not  draw  inspiration  from  Nature. 
Victor  Hugo's  realism  was  self-engendered  (the  petits 
cahiers  of  Zola  and  of  Daudet  were  not  of  his  day) ;  and 
whilst  he  was  writing  Noire  Dame  cie  Paris,  although  at 
that  time  he  was  living  within  ten  minutes'  walk  of  the 
cathedral,  he  never  stirred  from  his  room  during  the  six 
weeks  that  he  spent  over  that  book.  The  Hauteville 
House  workroom  was  as  barely  furnished  as  all  his 
cabinets  de  travail  had  been.  It  contained  nothing  but 
a  high  deal  desk,  painted  black,  at  which  he  used  to 
write  standing.  "  As  each  sheet  is  finished  it  is  thrown 
on  to  the  ground,  and  we  collect  them  afterwards."  I 
was  informed  that  he  used  rough  hand-made  paper  and 
quills.  "  The  roughness  of  the  paper  is  the  only  check 
on  the  flow  of  his  composition." 

The  Philistines  of  Hauteville  used  to  object  that  the 
poet  often,  as  he  warmed  to  his  work,  was  wont,  when 
writing  under  the  hot  sun  in  that  conservatory,  to  divest 
himself  of  some  of  his  clothing.  They  stated  that  it  was 
his  usual  habit  to  show  himself  in  that  prominent  place, 
where  he  was  visible  to  every  eye,  in  a  state  of  almost 
complete  nudity.  This  was  not  true  ;  and  the  fact  that 
under  the  true  conditions  of  his  deshabille  such  a  master- 
piece as  Les  Travailleurs  de  la  Mer  had  been  produced 
could  by  no  means  be  taken  into  consideration. 

With  my  boy  companions  on  the  island,  what  made 


VICTOR   HUGO   AND   THE    PIEUVRE      5 

for  his  unpopularity  and  provoked  their  criticism  was  that 
passage  in  Les  Travailleurs  de  la  Mer,  where  Hugo 
describes  the  fiorht  between  Gilliat  and  the  devil-fish  in 
the  very  waters  in  which  we  used  to  bathe.  The  child 
who  has  been  deceived  does  not  readily  restore  its 
confidence.  Victor  Hugo  had  fi-ightened  us.  The 
pleasure  of  long  swims  out  to  sea  had  been  poisoned 
at  its  source  ;  sheer  terror  followed  in  the  ripples  made 
by  every  stroke  of  the  arm  ;  the  viscous  and  clinging 
contact  of  some  submarine  plant  evoked  a  shout  of 
terror.  Yet  we  knew  that  there  was  no  truth  in  the 
•description ;  that  such  monsters  as  he  had  depicted 
never  came  into  our  peaceful  waters,  and  that  when  he 
affirmed  that  he  had  with  his  own  eyes  seen  a  huge 
devil-fish  pursuing  a  terror-stricken  bather  in  a  cave 
in  Sark  he  was  indulging  in — in — well,  poetic  licence. 

There  was  much  malicious  talk  about  Victor  Hugo 
in  Guernsey,  where,  as  in  other  small  communities, 
prejudice  is  very  rampant.  There  was  a  story  told 
about  his  cruelty  to  one  of  his  daughters  which  repre- 
sented him  in  a  most  unfavourable  light.  It  was  said 
that  this  daughter,  having  eloped  with  a  British  officer, 
who  deceived  her  into  a  clandestine  and  illegal  marriage, 
was  refused  admission  to  her  father's  house,  when,  some 
time  later,  having  been  cast  off  by  her  betrayer,  she  had 
returned  to  Guernsey.  It  was  added  that  her  father's 
cruelty,  coming  after  her  cruel  betrayal,  had  affected  her 
mind.  I  think  that  the  fact  that  one  of  Victor  Hugo's 
daughters  was  insane  was  the  only  foundation  for  a 
story  which  for  years  made  people  shrug  their  shoulders 
at  the  poet's  professions  of  wide  humanity.  Slanderers 
are  a  very  contemptible  race.  Indeed,  their  very  practice 
and  infamy  are  confessions  of  their  own  inferiority.  The 
harm  they  do  is  incalculable.     Few  people  there  are  who 


6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

have  not  cause  to  retard  having  listened  to  their  evil 
talcs  about  their  contemporaries.  I  remember  that  when 
I  first  came  to  Paris,  and  desired  to  make  the  acquaint- 
ance of  Alphonse  Daudet,  I  was  told  that  he  was  a 
man  of  most  unfriendly  disposition,  who  harboured  for 
English  people  a  special  dislike,  and  that  to  present 
myself  at  his  house  would  be  to  expose  myself  to  slight 
and  affront.  I  believed  this  story  for  years,  and  for  as 
many  years  was  deprived  of  a  friendship  which  later 
was  the  joy  and  pride  of  my  life. 

At  the  age  of  seventy-nine,  when  I  saw  him  again 
in  Paris,  Victor  Hugo  presented  an  appearance  of  extra- 
ordinary physical  vitality.  His  face  until  almost  the 
very  end  was  full  and  coloured,  and  with  his  white 
hair  brushed  back  over  his  monumental  forehead,  he 
looked  like  a  sturdy  and  weather-beaten  sea-captain  on 
whose  robust  frame  a  hundred  storms  had  broken. 
Time  had  not  dimmed  the  wonderful  lustre  of  the  eyes 
which  have  been  compared  to  the  unforgettable  eyes  of 
the  great  Napoleon.  His  activity  and  hardihood  seemed 
undiminished.  It  was  his  habit  almost  till  his  last  illness 
to  explore  Paris,  now  on  foot,  now  riding  on  the  top  of 
an  omnibus.  I  have  descried  his  noticeable  form  in  the 
remotest  parts  of  Paris.  It  was  said  that  at  that  time 
every  detective  and  every  police  officer  carried  in  his 
pocket  the  photographs  of  two  remarkable  old  men,  of 
whom  Victor  Hugo  was  one,  so  that  in  case  their  tastes 
for  exploring  the  bas-fonds  of  Paris  might  lead  them  into 
perilous  adventures,  the  public  scandal  of  an  arrest  might 
be  avoided. 

It  often  struck  me  that  perhaps  the  finest  trait  in 
Victor  Hugo's  character  was,  that  in  the  midst  of  the 
great  and  universal  adulation  with  which  in  his  extreme 
old    age    he    lived    surrounded,    his    natural    simplicity 


HERO-WORSHIP   EXTRAORDINARY        7 

and  external  modesty  never  deserted  him.  The  head 
of  even  the  strongest  man  might  have  been  turned ; 
and  in  this  respect  also  Hugo  was  undoubtedly,  so  it 
appeared  to  me,  one  of  the  strongest  of  men.  It  used 
to  afford  me  amusement,  not  altogether  untinged  with 
regret,  on  the  days  of  his  public  receptions,  to  listen  to 
the  terms  in  which  the  interpreters  introduced  to  him 
parties  of  diverse  nationalities.  A  group  of  English  or 
American  girls  would,  for  instance,  say  to  their  guide, 
"  Oh !  tell  Mr.  Hugo  that  we  have  read  his  works, 
and  liked  them  so  much,  and  that  we  are  so  pleased  to 
see  him."  This,  with  appropriate  gestures,  would  be 
rendered,  "  Illustrious  master,  these  young  daughters 
of  the  young  Republic"  (or  "of  an  antique  monarchy," 
as  the  case  might  be)  "  feel  it  impossible  to  leave  Paris 
without  laying  at  the  feet  of  that  genius  which  is  the 
imperishable  glory  of  France  and  the  wonder  and  honour 
of  the  universe,  the  laurel  wreath  of  their  profoundest 
admiration  and  homage."  "  C'est  gentil,"  the  poet  used 
to  answer ;  but  I  always  felt  that  he  saw  the  silliness 
of  such  phraseology.  I  have  been  told  that,  on  the 
contrary,  he  considered  such  an  address  as  no  more  than 
his  due,  that  his  conceit  of  himself  amounted  almost  to 
megalomania,  and  that  he  was  profoundly  in  earnest 
when  he  made  his  memorable  threat  that  after  death  he 
would  track  the  Almighty  to  the  furthest  recesses  of  the 
heavens  and  cry,  "  Maintenant,  Seigneur,  expliquons- 
nous." 

Such  seemed  to  me  to  be  the  opinion,  for  instance,  of 
Monsieur  Hippolyte  Taine.  In  one  of  the  many  con- 
versations I  had  with  that  eminent  man  we  fell  one  day 
to  talking  about  the  French  Academy  and  the  various 
men  who  had  failed  as  members  of  that  "  fashionable 
club."     It  was  apropos  of  Zola's   candidature.     "  There 


8  TWRNTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

arc  several  men."  saitl  Tainc  to  iiic,  "  who,  having  entered 
the  Academy,  wi-re  never  able  to  make  themselves  at 
home  there.  The  atmosphere  of  the  place  never  seemed 
to  agree  with  them.  Look  at  Victor  Hugo,  who,  during 
the  last  of  his  life,  came  to  the  Academy  once  or  twice 
only  each  year.  He  was  not  at  home  in  a  club  where 
the  greatest  equality  reigns.  Accustomed  to  being 
treated  as  an  idol  at  home  and  outside,  he  felt  utterly 
out  of  place  in  such  an  assembly." 

But  so  he  did  not  appear  to  me  at  the  time,  and  I 
watched  him  closely.  He  seemed  to  me  to  be  naturally 
gratified  and  touched  by  attention.  After  the  hour-long 
procession  past  his  house,  on  the  occasion  of  his  anniver- 
sar)',  when  delegates  came  from  every  part  of  the  world 
to  do  honour  to  him  by  the  march  past,  his  remark  was, 
"  How  good  it  is  of  these  young  people  to  have  come, 
many  from  so  far,  just  to  give  me  pleasure!"  He  seemed 
to  me  to  object  to  anything  like  subservience  and  self- 
abasement.  One  night,  as  I  was  taking  leave  of  him 
and  he  had  given  me  his  hand,  I  bent  my  head  over  it, 
prompted  to  do  a  liege's  obeisance  to  the  hand  that  had 
done  such  royal  work.  But  Hugo  drew  it  back  and 
said,  "  That  is  done  to  kings  only."  Then  he  gripped 
mine  firmly  and  added,  "  Voila  comment  cela  se  fait 
entre  hommes." 

The  only  sign  there  was  that  age  had  taken  any  hold 
upon  him  was  that  every  night  after  dinner,  almost  as 
soon  as  he  had  taken  his  place  in  the  reception-room,  he 
used  to  go  off  into  a  doze.  Auguste  Vacquerie,  who 
always  sat  on  his  left  hand,  used,  as  soon  as  this 
had  occurred,  to  raise  a  warning  finger  ;  the  whisper, 
"  The  master  sleeps,"  ran  round  the  room,  and  conver- 
sation was  hushed  into  undertones.  This  reception-room 
was  curiously  disposed.     It  was  bare  of  furniture,  except 


VICTOR   HUGO   AND    HIS   CIRCLE        9 

a  double  row  oi  fauteuils,  facing  each  other,  which  ran  in 
parallel  lines  from  the  fireplace,  halfway  down  the  room. 
Opposite  the  fireplace  was  the  door  through  which  one 
entered  the  dining-room,  and  in  the  corners  were 
statuettes,  marble  and  bronze,  on  pedestals,  votive  offer- 
ings to  the  master  of  the  house.  Each  of  i\\Q.s&  fauteuils 
had  its  titulary,  who  was  as  jealous  of  its  possession  as 
any  lady  at  the  Court  of  Versailles  was  of  her  tabouret. 
The  one  on  the  left  hand  nearest  the  fireplace  was  the 
master's  seat.  Madame  Juliette  Drouet  used  to  sit 
opposite  him  in  the  fauteuil  on  the  right  of  the  fire- 
place. To  this  seat,  every  evening  after  dinner,  he 
used  to  conduct  her,  leading  her  in  courtier  fashion  by 
the  tips  of  her  fingers  with  uplifted  arm.  When  she 
had  seated  herself  he  used  to  bow  to  her,  kiss  her  hand, 
and  then  step  back  into  his  own  seat.  Vacquerie  always 
sat  next  to  Victor  Hugo,  and  next  to  Madame  Drouet 
was  Paul  Meurice's  seat.  The  place  next  to  Vacquerie 
was  reserved  {or  visitors  of  distinction.  It  was  accorded 
to  Oscar  Wilde  on  the  night  when  I  introduced  him 
into  the  master's  circle.  Generally,  however,  it  was 
occupied  by  a  Polish  princess,  who  was  translating 
Swinburne  into  French  verse,  and  who  once  expressed 
great  indignation  because  Hugo's  secretary  asked  me 
to  what  was  to  be  attributed  the  English  poet's  exces- 
sive excitement.  This  was  shortly  after  Swinburne's 
memorable  visit. 

The  rest  of  the  chairs  were  assigned  each  to  some 
member  of  the  household  or  habitu^  of  the  receptions. 
Hoi polloi  disposed  themselves  in  standing  groups  about 
the  room.  No  little  malevolent  gossip  used  to  be 
whispered  round.  "  You  are  now  to  be  instructed  in 
the  art  of  being  a  grandfather,"  was  said  to  me  on  the 
occasion  of  my  first  visit,  as  the  clock  struck  a  certain 


lo  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

hour.  h  appeared  that  at  a  fixed  nionicnt  in  the 
evenintr  Jeanne  and  Georges  used  to  come  in  to  bid 
their  grandfather  good-night.  Tlie  suggestion  whispered 
to  me  was  that  the  old  man's  show  of  dehght  in  his 
beautiful  grandchildren,  as  well  as  their  demonstrations 
of  childish  affection,  were  so  much  theatrical  display  in- 
tended to  impress  the  visitors.  But  I  felt  very  certain 
of  the  sincerity  of  Victor  Hugo's  joy  in  their  caresses. 

I  have  no  recollection  of  what  passed  between  Victor 
Hugo  and  Oscar  Wilde  ;  but  I  think  that  their  exchange 
of  courtesies  cannot  have  been  more  than  the  briefest. 
I  remember  seeing  Victor  Hugo  asleep  very  shortly 
after  I  had  presented  the  young  Irish  poet  to  him. 
Vacquerie's  warning  finger  had  been  held  up,  and  Wilde's 
brilliant  talk  on  English  poets  in  general,  and  on 
Swinburne  in  particular,  had  had  to  be  carried  on  in 
undertones.  It  must  have  been  to  him  an  exercise  to  be 
brilliant  in  a  whisper;  but  I  do  not  doubt  that  he  acquitted 
himself  well,  for  the  habitues  of  the  reception  crowded 
round  him,  and  both  Vacquerie  and  the  Polish  princess 
seemed  to  hang  on  his  lips. 

In  this  milieu  the  pleasing  fiction  that  kings  are 
tyrants  was  sedulously  kept  alive.  I  really  believe  that 
when  Victor  Hugo  and  Auguste  Vacquerie  interceded 
with  foreign  potentates  by  means  of  rhetorical  after- 
dinner  telegrams  on  behalf  of  notorious  criminals  under 
sentence  of  death,  they  actually  deceived  themselves  into 
the  belief  that  the  person  whom  they  were  addressing 
was  directly  responsible  for  the  culprit's  condemnation, 
and  could  at  pleasure,  without  incurring  any  responsibility, 
accede  to  their  requests.  When  the  late  Queen  Victoria 
left  unanswered  a  despatch  from  Hauteville  House  in 
which  Victor  Hugo  recommended  to  her  mercy  a  Jersey 
murderer,  some  very  foolish  remarks  were  made  by  the 


VICTOR    HUGO   AND   THE    KINGS       ii 

poet  about  the  Queen's  want  of  humanity.  Such  talk 
was  the  common  thing  when  these  wild  appeals  were 
left  unanswered.  It  flattered  the  middle-class  Liberalism 
of  the  French,  to  which  Victor  Hugo  as  a  novelist,  and 
Vacquerie  as  a  journalist,  more  specially  appealed.  One 
cannot  forget  the  absurd  article  which  the  latter  published 
in  his  paper,  Le  Rappel,  on  the  occasion  of  the  birth  of 
King  Alfonso  of  Spain.  It  was  a  diatribe  against  royalty 
in  general  and  against  the  baby  sovereign  in  particular. 
It  was  illustrative  of  the  nonsense  that  used  to  be  talked 
in  Hugo's  house,  a  remembrance  of  long  after-dinner 
conversations  between  the  dead  poet  and  the  writer  of 
the  article.  "  The  mess  that  the  baby  makes  in  its 
cradle,  that  is  royalty."  One  would  hardly  fancy  that 
such  things  could  be  written,  but  the  article  is  still  to  be 
found  on  the  Rappel  file. 

Vacquerie  was  a  mild  and  benevolent  man,  and  it 
must  have  been  with  extremest  effort  that  he  worked 
himself  into  the  proper  state  of  excitement  under 
which  to  write  this  and  similar  articles.  One  might 
have  attributed  the  delusion  that  breathed  in  every 
line  to  the  fiery  and  disturbing  influence  of  alcohol, 
had  one  not  known  that  Vacquerie,  who  was  a  vale- 
tudinarian, used  to  write  his  articles  in  bed  whilst 
sipping  cold  bouillon.  It  was  customary  at  the  house  in 
the  Avenue  Victor  Hugo  to  speak  of  kings  as  tyrants  of 
rapacious  and  sanguinary  instincts.  Yet  perhaps  no 
man  in  Paris  had  for  either  Victor  Hugo  or  Vacquerie 
a  more  cordial  salute  or  a  more  courtly  bow  than  a 
dethroned  king  of  the  very  mildest  disposition.  This 
was  Queen  Isabella's  husband,  Dom  Francis  of  Spain, 
who  often  took  his  many  dogs  for  an  airing  in  the 
Avenue  Victor  Hugo.  It  was  known  that  he  was 
always  hugely  delighted   if,    on    returning   to  his   little 


12  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

house  in  the  Rue  Lcsucur,  he  could  tell  his  equerry 
that  durintj  his  walk  he  had  met  either  the  author  of 
Lc  Roi  s  .Iniusc  or  the  editor  of  J^c  Rappcl.  I  was 
present  one  evening  at  Hugo's  house  when  there 
arrived  a  telecfram  from  the  Russian  Minister  of  the 
Interior,  in  answer  to  one  addressed  to  Gatschina  on 
the  previous  evening — a  most  absurd  message  it  was — 
announcing  that  a  number  of  Nihilists,  who  had  been 
lying  under  sentence  of  death,  had  been  reprieved. 
The  exultation  expressed  was  very  great  ;  the  excite- 
ment, almost  childish.  I  wondered  whether  these 
manifestations  of  satisfaction — Vacquerie  danced  round 
the  room  waving  his  hands,  whilst  Victor  Hugo 
hammered  on  the  table  with  his  knife  and  fork — were 
to  be  attributed  as  much  to  the  joy  that  so  many  lives 
had  been  spared  as  to  the  evidence  it  gave  that  the 
influence  of  Hugo  could  make  itself  felt  even  at  the 
remote  Court  of  St.   Petersburg. 

One  of  the  very  last  times  when  Victor  Hugo  wrote 
his  name — I  believe  that  it  really  was  the  last  time — 
was  a  week  or  two  before  his  death.  It  was  done  to 
oblige  me.      It  now  figures  in  the  famous  birthday-book 

of   Lady    D N ,   amongst   the    most   complete 

collection  of  royal  and  imperial  autographs  that  probably 
exists  anywhere  in  England  outside  of  Buckingham 
Palace.  I  had  taken  the  book  to  the  house  in  the 
Avenue  Victor  Hugo,  together  with  a  letter  to  the  poet 
in  which  I  asked  him  to  grant  a  lady  this  favour.  The 
letter  had  been  written  for  me  by  one  of  Hugo's  mtimes, 
in  the  place  of  a  courteous  note  which  I  had  written. 
"  That  will  not  do  at  all,"  he  had  said,  after  reading  my 
letter.  "  You  evidently  do  not  know  how  one  addresses 
ihe  master."  He  had  then  written  for  me  a  letter 
which  I  considered  most  absurd. 


VICTOR   HUGO'S   LAST   AUTOGRAPH    13 

One  of  his  representations  was  that  every  religion 
needs  an  emblem.  *'  Or,  sans  embleme,"  so  ran  one 
of  the  servile  phrases,  "  il  n'y  a  pas  de  culte." 
I  had  fancied  that  no  man  could  tolerate  flattery  so 
obvious  and  so  high-flown.  The  book  lay  for  many 
weeks  in  the  house  of  the  Avenue  Victor  Hugo. 
I  have  been  told  that  before  entering  his  name  upon 
the  pages  he  turned  over  the  leaves  and  examined 
with  interest  many  of  the  famous  signatures  which 
passed  before  his  eyes.  He  saw  there  the  sign-manual 
of  Louis  Napoleon,  and  no  doubt  that  in  that  serenity 
which  is  the  dawn  of  the  better  life,  all  the  old 
feelings  of  enmity,  if  indeed  remembered,  were  put 
aside.  The  autograph  of  the  Iron  Duke  would 
recall  to  him  the  deeds  of  General  Sigisbert  Hugo, 
his  father,  and  perhaps  for  the  last  time  there  would 
be  remembered  the  old,  ever-rankling  grievance  that 
Sigisbert  Hugo's  name  was  not  inscribed  amongst  those 
of  other  heroes  on  the  Arc  de  Triomphe.  For  which 
imperial  slight  the  Republic  was  to  make  magnificent 
amends  when  the  Arc  de  Triomphe  became  the  canopy 
of  Hugo's  funeral  bier. 

The  publication  of  Victor  Hugo's  public  testament 
produced  a  very  bad  impression  in  Paris.  It  had  been 
written  probably  many  years  previously,  and  the  phrases 
and  professions  on  which  the  poet  had  counted  for  effect 
entirely  failed  to  impress  the  public.  His  desire  to  be 
carried  to  his  grave  in  the  paupers'  hearse  was  described 
as  theatrical  posturing ;  but  what  excited  the  most 
malevolent  comment  was  the  legacy  of  two  thousand 
pounds  to  the  poor  of  Paris  :  "  Je  donne  cinquante  mille 
francs  aux  pauvres,"  The  sum  seemed  ridiculously 
small ;  the  grandiloquent  simplicity  of  the  wording  of 
the  bequest,  preposterous.     The  phrase  rang  out  as  an 


14  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

anti-climax.  People  said  that,  having  gained  milHons 
by  exploiting  the  sentimentality  of  the  middle  classes 
towards  the  sufferings  of  the  poor  and  forlorn,  Hugo 
might  have  shown  himself  more  generous.  I  have  no 
doubt,  however,  that  the  testament  was  written  at  an 
early  period  in  his  career  ;  at  a  time  when  two  thousand 
pounds  represented  a  large  part  of  his  fortune ;  at  a 
time  when  fifty  thousand  francs  was  considered  a  con- 
siderable sum  in  France.  One  has  but  to  remember 
what  was  the  idea  of  "  fabulous  wealth,"  as  conceived 
by  Alexandre  Dumas  when  he  endowed  the  Comte  de 
Monte  Christo,  to  appreciate  Hugo's  magnificence  at 
something  like  its  value.  I  was  reading  the  other  day 
a  passage  in  one  of  Paul  de  Kock's  novels,  where  one 
hundred  thousand  francs  was  spoken  of  as  "an  enormous 
sum  of  money."  I  can  well  remember  the  time  when 
an  income  of  a  thousand  a  year  was  considered  in  Paris 
a  situation  of  fortune  to  be  remarked  upon.  It  was 
De  Maupassant  who  first  as  a  novelist  indicated  the  new 
and  reduced  value  of  money.  In  Bel-Ami,  when  George 
Duroy  and  his  wife  have  inherited  a  million  francs,  they 
mournfully  admit  that  their  new  income  will  not  enable 
them  to  keep  a  carriage.  And  though  people  are  now 
beginning  in  France  to  understand  the  huge  amounts  of 
wealth  which  can  be  acquired  and  held  by  one  man, 
the  old  exaggerated  notion  of  the  value  of  money  still 
persists.  Only  the  other  day  the  papers  were  writing  of 
young  Baron  Adelsward,  the  hero  of  the  Black  Mass,  as 
"  a  young  man  colossally  rich."  His  income,  it  appeared, 
was  sixteen  hundred  pounds  a  year. 

At  the  same  time,  Victor  Hugo's  income  had  been 
steadily  decreasing  for  years  before  his  death.  After 
1885  the  sales  of  his  works  still  further  diminished. 
The  publication  of  the  "  National  Monumental  Edition" 


A   DECLINE    IN    POPULARITY  15 

of  his  works  ruined  several  people  who  were  connected 
with  that  enterprise.  Part  of  Jeanne  Hugo's  dowry, 
when  she  married  Leon  Daudet,  was  represented  by  her 
share  in  the  annual  royalties  accruing  from  her  grand- 
father's books,  and  the  revenue  so  produced  was  a  cause 
of  great  disappointment  to  the  young  couple.  At  the 
time  of  Victor  Hugo's  death,  however,  Paris  believed 
that  the  poet  was  drawing  really  large  sums  from  his 
publishers,  and  laughed  malevolently  at  the  meagreness 
of  a  donation  announced  with  so  loud  a  flourish  of 
rhetorical  trumpets. 


CHAPTER    II 

Crime  and  Punishment  in  Fiance — The  Leniency  Displayed — The  Senti- 
mentality of  the  French  Jury — Women  and  the  Law — The  Last 
Execution  of  a  Woman  in  France — English  and  French  Judges 
Compared — Maitre  Henri  Robert  and  his  Client — Joseph  Aubert  the 
Murderer — His  Gascon  Imagination — My  Dealings  with  him— Aubert 
as  a  Postage-Stamp  Collector — Aubert  and  the  Insurance  Clerk — The 
Stamp-CoUector  at  Work. 

THERE  can  be  no  doubt  that  Victor  Hugo  exercised 
considerable  influence  in  France  on  the  application 
of  the  penal  code.  It  was  understood  that  Monsieur 
Grevy's  notorious  objection  to  the  death-penalty  had  been 
caused  by  reading  Les  Derniers  Joui's  dtm  Condamnd. 
But  I  think  that  the  extraordinary  leniency  of  the  French 
juries  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  the  Executive  on  the  other, 
as  they  are  witnessed  to-day,  are  only  another  manifesta- 
tion of  the  spirit  of  anarchy  which  is  disaggregating  in 
France  the  public  thing.  A  general  desire  to  shirk  re- 
sponsibility is  the  leading  trait  of  modern  French  civicism. 
One  would  like  to  attribute  to  superior  humanity  the 
extraordinary  difference  that  exists  in  France,  as  com- 
pared to  England,  in  the  measures  adopted  for  the 
repression  of  crime.  But  though  in  some  cases,  as,  for 
instance,  in  cases  of  infanticide,  humanity  may  dictate 
leniency  to  French  judges  and  juries,  this  leniency,  in 
the  great  majority  of  sentences,  is  prompted  rather  by  a 
number  of  less  estimable  motives.  For  one  thing  the 
spirit  of  the  Fronde  is  ever  alive  in  the  hearts  of  French- 

l6 


LENIENCY   IN    FRANCE  17 

men.  It  delights  the  French  juryman  to  put  himself  in 
opposition  to  the  Government,  as  represented  by  the 
Procureur  de  la  Republique,  or  prosecuting  counsel.  It 
pleases  him  also  to  use  his  power  to  nullify  laws  the 
amendment  of  which  he  may  desire.  Private  interests 
and  personal  considerations  direct  juries  in  France  more 
than  they  undoubtedly  do  in  England.  It  is,  for  instance, 
practically  useless  for  the  authorities  to  prosecute  for 
infanticide  before  a  rural  jury.  The  rural  juryman  in 
France  reasons  to  himself  as  follows  :  "If  the  woman 
had  allowed  her  child  to  live,  it  would  have  become  a 
charge  on  the  commune,  and  we  have  quite  enough  com- 
munal charges  as  it  is.  The  child  was  better  out  of  the 
way,  and  I  cannot  see  that  we  should  punish  the  woman 
for  rendering  us  a  service." 

I  remember  a  case  where  a  country  jury  not  only 
acquitted  a  woman  for  murdering  her  illegitimate 
child,  but  subscribed  a  sum  of  money  which  they 
presented  to  her  as  she  was  leaving  the  dock  amidst 
the  acclaim  of  the  populace.  On  the  other  hand,  the 
same  country  juries  show  implacable  severity  in  cases 
where  their  own  interests  are  menaced.  The  vagabond, 
the  pilferer,  the  poacher  find  small  grace  in  their  eyes. 
Many  of  the  sentences  passed  in  the  provincial  assize 
courts  upon  crimes  against  property  are  of  Draconian 
harshness.  It  is  in  France,  for  instance,  a  capital 
offence  to  set  fire  to  an  inhabited  house,  even  where  no 
loss  of  life  occurs.  In  many  such  cases  within  my 
recollection  country  juries  have  convicted  without  the 
admission  of  extenuating  circumstances,  and  in  one  case 
that  I  remember  the  convict  was  duly  guillotined. 

In  the  early  part  of  this  present  year  a  man  was 
sentenced  to  death  on  the  verdict  of  a  provincial  jury  for 
attempted    murder,    although    his    victim    had    entirely 

2 


i8  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

recovered  from  the  attack  iind  was  able  to  give  evidence 
against  liim.  Monsieur  Loubet  did  not  see  fit  to  revise  the 
sentence  ;  the  man  had  been  for  years  a  pest  and  a  menace 
to  the  department  in  which  he  was  convicted,  and  his 
execution  followed  as  a  matter  of  course.  The  French  law 
considers  the  attempt  at  a  crime,  where  there  has  been 
a  commencement  of  execution,  as  culpable  as  the  crime 
successfully  carried  out.  The  second  clause  of  the  penal 
code  categorically  lays  dowm  the  law  on  this  subject. 
Prado,  the  murderer,  was  sentenced  to  death  twice  over, 
once  for  shooting  at  a  policeman. 

The  sovereignty  of  the  law,  which  in  England  is 
paramount,  is  not  recognised  by  French  jurymen.  They 
are  always  ready  to  admit  a  man's  right  to  take  the  law 
into  his  own  hands.  In  many  cases  where  a  woman  acts 
so,  her  right  is  even  more  readily  admitted.  Inasmuch 
as  affiliation  is  distinctly  forbidden  by  the  Code  Napoleon, 
the  seduced  woman  who  shoots  her  betrayer  or  disfigures 
and  blinds  him  with  vitriol  is  most  invariably  assured  of 
a  triumphant  acquittal.  The  largest  license  is  allowed 
to  women  in  the  defence  of  their  honour.  When  Madame 
Clovis  Hugues,  the  wife  of  the  Socialist  deputy  and 
poet,  slew  Morin,  the  private  detective,  in  the  Salle 
des  Pas  Perdus  of  the  Palais  de  Justice  in  Paris,  acting 
with  so  much  deliberation  that  after  the  wretched  man 
had  fallen  to  the  ground  from  the  effect  of  her  first  shot, 
she  emptied  her  revolver  into  his  body,  her  detention 
was  no  more  in  question  than  her  acquittal  was  doubtful. 
It  is  justifiable  homicide  in  France  to  kill  a  man  who 
enters  your  enclosure  at  night,  although  he  may  have 
no  more  wicked  motive  than  to  steal  a  few  vegetables 
or  a  little  fruit.  A  burglar  may  be  shot  down  or  other- 
wise slain  like  a  mad  dog,  and  not  even  an  hour's  arrest 
would  result  to  the  slayer. 


WOMEN   AND   THE    LAW  19 

The  plea  of  "legitimate  defence"  is  so  elastic  that 
a  man  who  in  a  short  fight  may  shoot  or  stab  an 
unarmed  aggressor  will  not  even  be  sent  for  trial. 
Indeed,  the  plea  has  often  been  admitted  when  a  man, 
having  been  attacked,  escapes,  provides  himself  with  a 
lethal  weapon,  returns  to  resume  the  fight,  and  kills  the 
original  aggressor.  I  have  seen  homicides  acquitted  in 
France  in  cases  of  this  kind  where  the  medley  has  been 
resumed  after  an  interval  of  several  days.  The  argument 
in  favour  of  the  prisoner  was  that  he  was  acting  within 
the  limits  of  "legitimate  defence"  to  destroy  an  adver- 
sary from  whom  he  had  reason  to  suspect  aggression. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  right  of  a  husband  to  kill  his 
wife  and  her  accomplice  in  adultery,  if  he  detect  them  in 
flagrante  delicto,  has  never  been  recognised  either  by 
the  French  law  or  by  the  jury  ;  and  in  many  cases  that 
I  remember,  a  conviction,  though  never  a  capital  one, 
has  been  the  sanction  of  an  act  which  in  England  is 
considered  excusable.  Alexandre  Dumas's  Tue  la  of 
the  appendix  to  U Afl^aire  CUvienceatt  has  always  been 
violently  disputed  in  France.  To-day,  the  precept  thus 
laid  down  is  generally  considered  little  less  than  an 
incitement  to  a  cowardly  and  most  culpable  murder.  I 
think  that  the  verdicts  in  the  Fenayrou  affair  showed 
that  the  theory  of  the  husband's  power  of  life  and  death 
over  his  wife's  paramour  was  not  one  that  could  always 
be  pleaded  with  effect  before  a  French  jury. 

One  has  to  remember,  in  considering  the  leniency 
with  which  the  criminal  law  is  applied  in  France,  that 
in  this  country  of  recurrent  revolutions  antagonism  to 
the  law  always  exists  in  a  chronic  if  sub-acute  state. 
The  jurymen,  I  repeat,  are  inspired  by  the  spirit 
of  the  Fronde.  Until  quite  recently  the  magistracy  and 
the  judges  were  recruited  almost  exclusively  from  the 


20  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

reactionary  classes.  The  prisoner  is  considered  by  his 
judges  more  as  an  offender  against  the  Government 
than  as  an  offender  against  the  law,  and  the  political 
spirit  is  rarely  absent  even  from  the  most  commonplace 
criminal  trial. 

At  the  same  time  the  great  impressionability  of  the 
averaqfe  Frenchman  must  be  taken  into  consideration. 
He  can  be  moved  by  sentimental  considerations  which 
if  propounded  to  an  English  jury  by  an  English  barrister 
in  our  country  would  excite  nothing  but  ridicule.  The 
criminal  law  barrister  who  in  France  is  the  most  suc- 
cessful is  the  one  like  Monsieur  Henri  Robert,  who  can 
most  readily  move  a  jury  to  tears.  Before  the  trial  of 
a  murderer,  to  whom  I  shall  presently  refer,  Monsieur 
Robert,  who  had  been  briefed  for  the  defence,  wrote  to 
me  in  London  to  ask  me  to  write  about  his  client,  with 
whom  I  had  been  acquainted,  such  a  letter  relating  any 
good  that  I  knew  of  his  character  as  he  could  read 
with  effect  to  the  jury.  I  complied  with  his  request, 
and  I  had  the  mixed  satisfaction  of  hearing  that  I  had 
contributed  in  gaining  for  this  man  an  admission  of 
"  extenuating  circumstances." 

It  must  be  remembered  that  in  France  the  judge 
cannot  counteract  the  most  irrelevant  arguments  ad 
ho77iineni.  It  is  years  since  the  right  of  summing-up 
was  taken  away  from  the  Court  in  France.  The 
prisoner's  counsel  always  has  the  last  word,  unless, 
indeed,  the  prisoner  himself  likes  to  address  the  jury 
on  his  own  behalf;  and,  accordingly,  the  jury  are  often 
sent  to  their  consulting-room  with  the  tears  streaming 
from  their  eyes.  The  result  is,  given  the  French 
character,  that  the  chances  of  acquittal  even  where  guilt 
is  proved  are  great,  and  that  often,  at  the  worst,  such 
a  verdict   is   pronounced  as   entails  only   slight  punish- 


SENTIMENTALITY   OF   FRENCH    JURIES  21 

ment.  Monsieur  Robert,  by  his  eloquence,  has  restored 
to  society  in  France  many  criminals  who  in  England 
would  have  had  but  the  shortest  shrift.  He  has  raised 
irrelevancy  and  a  disregard  of  the  law  to  a  fine  art,  and 
has  proved  himself  a  worthy  disciple  of  his  master,  the 
great  Lachaud. 

Certain  sentimental  considerations  appear  in  France 
to  rank  as  unwritten  amendments  to  certain  definite 
laws.  A  woman,  generally  speaking,  Is  considered 
excusable  for  killing  her  illegitimate  child,  I  have 
indicated  what  prompts  this  leniency  in  rural  districts. 
In  the  towns  her  guiltlessness  is  not  as  readily  recog- 
nised, but  even  before  the  severest  juries  the  verdict 
rendered  allows  only  of  a  short  sentence  of  imprisonment. 
It  has  often  occurred  to  me,  when  assisting  at  the  Old 
Bailey  in  London  at  the  trial  for  child-murder  of  some 
forlorn  and  terror-stricken  female,  that  had  the  poor 
wretch  had  sufficient  knowledge  of  the  world  to  take  a 
third-class  ticket  from  London  to  France,  at  the  cost  of 
a  few  shillings,  she  could  have  ridded  herself  of  the 
living  witness  to  her  shame  with  no  greater  risk  than 
one  of  a  short  detention. 

Capital  punishment,  be  It  remarked,  Is  never  inflicted 
on  women  in  France.  Public  opinion  has  definitely 
decided  against  such  a  sanction  of  the  laws.  It  is  now 
close  upon  twenty  years  since  the  last  woman's  head  fell 
under  the  knife  of  the  guillotine.  The  execution  took 
place  on  the  public  square  in  Romorantin,  and  I  witnessed 
the  sanguinary  transaction  from  the  first  floor  of  the 
town-hall,  where,  as  a  drunken  municipal  councillor 
remarked  to  me,  we  were  "in  the  first  tier  of  boxes  to 
enjoy  the  spectacle."  The  execution  was  a  triple  one, 
and  the  crime  for  which  the  three  murderers  suffered  was 
one  of  a  very  deep  dye  of  turpitude. 


22  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

h  scorns  to  have  suggested  to  Zola  the  plot  and  the 
main  incident  of  his  novel  La  Terre.  A  peasant  woman, 
assisted  hy  her  husband  and  his  brother,  murdered  her 
old  mother,  who,  having  dispossessed  herself  in  her 
daughter's  favour  of  all  her  property,  had  come,  like  so 
many  old  peasants  in  France,  to  be  considered  a  useless 
burthen,  a  charge  to  be  ridded  of.  Even  Zola  did  not 
venture  to  transcribe  in  all  its  horror  the  shameful  story, 
for  though  old  Fouan  is  indeed  burned  to  death,  his 
children  imagined  him  to  be  dead  when  they  set  his 
body  alight. 

In  the  true  story,  however,  these  inhuman  children 
literally  roasted  their  mother  alive.  She  was  driven  into 
the  open  hearth,  and  whilst  the  woman  drenched  her 
from  a  petroleum  can,  the  two  men  prevented  her  from 
escaping  by  the  use  of  their  pitchforks. 

After  the  horrid  deed  had  been  consummated,  and 
the  old  woman's  body  had  been  consigned  to  the  village 
churchyard,  the  daughter,  in  the  ordinary  discharge  of 
her  religious  duties,  told  the  priest  of  the  village  in  the 
confessional  that  her  mother  had  not  fallen  into  the  fire 
by  accident,  and  gave  a  true  account  of  the  way  in  which 
she  had  come  by  her  death. 

The  poor  old  priest  was  so  horrified  by  what  he  had 
heard  that,  forgetting  his  oath  of  secrecy,  he,  almost 
unconsciously,  blurted  out  to  his  aged  housekeeper  a  story 
which  he  had  not  the  strength  to  conceal  in  his  bosom. 
In  this  way  the  authorities  were  put  on  the  track  of  the 
abominable  crime  which  had  been  committed,  and  the 
arrest  and  prosecution  of  the  three  peasants  followed 
as  a  matter  of  course.  The  poor  old  priest  was  most 
violently  attacked  by  the  Freethinkers,  who  found  here 
a  splendid  opportunity  for  calumniating  the  Church,  and 
he  was  dismissed  his  cure  with  ignominy. 


AN    EXECUTION    AT    ROMORANTIN      23 

I  arrived  at  my  place  at  one  of  the  windows  on  the 
first  floor  of  the  Romorantin  town-hall  just  after  the 
prisoners  had  been  brought  to  the  place  of  execution  in 
one  of  the  executioner's  vans.  I  remember  thinking 
what  a  small,  ugly,  and  unimposing  contrivance  the 
guillotine  appeared.  It  looked  more  like  some  clumsy, 
if  ingenious,  appliance  of  the  book-binder  or  metal- 
stamper's  craft  than  an  engine  which  is  the  ztlHiJia  ratio 
of  human  justice.  There  was  no  scaffold  ;  the  thing 
squatted  on  the  ground  like  some  monstrous  toad. 
Behind  the  blue  and  red  lines  of  the  rows  of  soldiers  a 
sea  of  faces  showed  ghastly  white  in  the  penumbra  of 
the  breaking  day.  The  only  worthy  figure  that  stood 
forth  in  all  that  mass  of  men  was  that  of  the  priest,  who, 
holding  his  crucifix  between  the  eyes  of  the  convicts  and 
the  knife  of  the  guillotine  so  as  to  mask  its  horror  from 
their  sight,  was  endeavouring  to  give  them  the  last 
consolations  of  his  faith. 

"  He  may  try  to  hide  the  guillotine  from  their  eyes," 
said  the  councillor  to  whom  I  have  referred  ;  "  that  does 
not  alter  the  fact  that  it  is  one  of  his  cloth  who  brouo-ht 

o 

them  here." 

I  knew  that  two  men  and  one  woman  were  to  be 
executed,  and  yet  I  saw  only  the  two  male  convicts. 
"The  woman  has  been  pardoned,  then?"   I  said. 

"  Oh,  no,"  said  the  councillor.  "  That  would  have 
been  du  propre.  No,  there  she  is!"  So  saying,  he 
pointed  to  a  heap  on  the  ground,  close  to  the  van,  which 
I   had  taken  for  a  bundle  of  rags. 

In  those  days  it  was  customary  in  France  that  when 
two  or  more  accomplices  were  executed  together,  the 
more  guilty  criminal  should  be  present  at  the  execution 
of  the  others,  and  suffer  last.  President  Carnot  ordered 
the  abolition  of  this   odious  custom  at  the  first  double 


24  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

execution  \vhich  took  j)lacc  under  his  presidency,  the 
execution  ot'  Scllicr  and  Allorto,  and  it  has  never  been 
resumed  since.  But  here  the  woman  was  supposed  to 
witness  the  execution  first  of  her  brother-in-law  and 
then  of  her  husband.  Nature,  however,  had  cloaked  her 
eyes.  She  had  fallen  fainting  to  the  ground  on  alighting 
from  the  executioner's  van. 

When  her  turn  came  to  suffer,  Monsieur  Deibler  was 
forced  to  rouse  her  from  her  swoon.  But  she  was  too 
exhausted  with  terror  to  walk  the  few  paces  that  separated 
her  from  the  guillotine,  and  the  executioner  had  to  carry 
her  thither.  She  was  struggling  all  the  way,  and  kept 
piteously  screaming  for  her  mother — "  Maman  !  Maman  ! 
Maman  !  " — as  she  may  have  done  as  a  little  child  when 
she  was  in  fear  or  danger.  I  need  not  say  that  this 
gave  the  drunken  Freethinker  an  excellent  opportunity 
to  display  his  wit  and  irony.  The  prisoner  was  bare- 
footed, with  a  shirt  drawn  over  her  clothes  and  a  black 
veil  bound  about  her  head.  This  is  the  costume  in 
which,  in  France,  all  parricides  go  to  the  scaffold.  The 
peculiar  and  unusual  costume  added  to  the  horror  of  one 
of  the  most  poignant  spectacles  which  I  have  ever 
witnessed.  It  is  certainly  to  the  credit  of  the  French 
that  such  displays  have  been  abolished  by  force  of 
public  opinion. 

In  contrasting  the  leniency  with  which  juries  and 
judges  in  France  deal  with  female  prisoners  with  the 
implacable  severity  which  is  meted  out  to  women  in  our 
own  country,  one  has  been  accustomed  to  attribute  to 
the  French  much  greater  humanity  than  distinguishes 
the  English.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  French 
are  more  impressionable,  and  possibly  more  accessible, 
to  the  feelings  of  pity  ;  but  one  must  not  overlook  the 
facts  that  in  England  the  respect  of  the  law  is  paramount, 


WOMEN   AND    THE    LAW  25 

and  that,  on  the  other  hand,  the  laws  afford  in  England 
protection  and  redress  to  injured  women  which  are 
pitilessly  refused  to  them  by  the  code  in   France. 

The  French  girl  who  has  been  seduced  has  no 
claim  on  the  father  of  her  child,  "  La  recherche  de  la 
paternite  est  interdite  "  is  a  formal  dictum  of  the  French 
law.  No  redress  in  the  way  of  recovery  of  damages  is 
open  to  the  woman  who  has  been  jilted,  no  matter  how 
cruel  and  perfidious  may  have  been  the  conduct  of  the 
man.  At  the  same  time,  it  is  certain  that  the  French 
take  a  more  humane  view  of  the  instinctive  foibles  of 
women,  admitting  that  their  recognised  inferiority  of 
strength  extends  also  to  their  power  of  combating 
passions  which  in  them,  by  a  curious  contrast,  blaze 
more  fiercely  than  in  the  male.  It  is  very  certain  that 
in  France,  for  instance,  such  a  sentence  as  was  passed  in 
June  of  this  year  on  Miss  Doughty  at  the  Old  Bailey 
would  have  aroused  a  storm  of  public  indignation. 

By  their  right  of  granting  or  of  withholding  an 
admission  of  "  extenuating  circumstances,"  the  French 
juries  have  the  means  of  circumscribing  the  judge's 
powers  in  the  allotment  of  punishment.  The  French 
juryman  is,  what  he  is  not  in  England,  a  judge  as  well 
as  a  juror.  The  convict's  sentence  is  practically  fixed 
in  the  jury's  consulting-room,  and  this  so  fully  coincides 
with  what  public  opinion  deems  to  be  right  that  it  has 
often  been  demanded  that  the  juries  should  be  precisely 
informed,  before  they  retire  to  their  deliberations,  as  to 
the  exact  penalties  which  each  of  the  different  verdicts 
which  they  are  entitled  to  pronounce  will  entail  on 
the  prisoner. 

When  in  a  capital  case  the  jury  finds  that  there  are 
extenuating  circumstances,  the  Court  cannot  pronounce 
the    death    penalty.     In    the    same    way    the   same   ad- 


26  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

mission  nuist  perforce  reduce  sentences  in  every  other 
class  of  conviction.  No  such  Hcense  as  in  England  is 
accorded  to  the  judge  in  France.  The  personal  element 
is  entirely  absent  from  the  pronouncements  of  the  pre- 
siding judge  at  a  criminal  trial.  It  is  not  within  his 
province,  as  it  must  certainly  is  not  within  his  desires, 
to  display  either  the  buffooneries  of  a  Quasimodo  or  the 
savagery  of  a  Torquemada.  He  contents  himself  with 
the  part  assigned  to  him  by  his  office,  and  is  the  law 
made  articulate.  When  he  delivers  sentence,  he  is 
constrained  by  the  regulations  of  his  order  to  read  out 
each  clause  of  the  law  which  defines  the  crime  of  which 
the  prisoner  heis  been  found  guilty,  and  which  establishes 
the  penalties  which  he  has  incurred.  There  is  an  air 
of  transcendency  about  the  whole  transaction  which  adds 
immeasurably  to  the  dignity  of  the  proceedings.  The 
French  judge,  speaking  for  doom,  though  he  place  no 
square  of  black  cloth  upon  a  masquerader's  wig,  impresses 
one,  inasmuch  as  through  his  mouth  one  seems  to  hear 
the  very  voice  and  accents  of  the  law,  with  all  its 
awful  majesty. 

It  is  because  of  the  power  that  the  jury  possesses  to 
reduce  the  sentences  prescribed  by  the  code  that  the 
efforts  of  counsel  in  France  are  so  largely  directed 
towards  arousing  pity  for  the  prisoner  in  the  hearts  of  the 
jurymen.  Every  conceivable  motive  for  compassion  is 
invoked,  and  I  am  not  at  all  certain  that  the  story  of  the 
barrister  who  claimed  the  pity  of  the  jury  for  a  parricide 
on  the  grounds  that  his  client  was  orphaned  is  nothing 
but  a  jest.  I  have  certainly  heard  arguments  ad  hornineni 
which  were  fully  as  absurd. 

Maitre  Henri  Robert's  great  argument  in  the  defence 
of  Joseph  Aubert,  the  murderer,  to  whom  I  have  referred 
above,    was    that   his    client's   state   of  health    was    so 


THE    CASE    OF   JOSEPH   AUBERT        27 

deplorable  that  it  would  be  cruel  to  put  a  term  to  his 
existence.  If  ever  there  was  a  case  of  murder  in  which 
the  death  penalty  was  justifiable,  this  was  undoubtedly 
the  one. 

I  first  made  the  acquaintance  of  Joseph  Aubert  in  a 
small  hotel  in  the  Latin  Quarter,  where  I  used  to  take  my 
meals.  Tragedy,  though  we  did  not  know  it,  was  a 
guest  at  that  table  d'hote  in  the  Rue  Champollion,  Of  the 
people  who  used  to  sit  down  to  dinner  in  the  gloomy 
room  which  looked  out  on  the  dark  courtyard,  one, 
Joseph  Aubert,  was  convicted  of  murder ;  another, 
a  musician  named  Salmon,  committed  suicide  ;  and  this 
was  also  the  way  in  which  a  third  guest,  the  poet  Rene 
Leclerc,  put  an  end  to  his  days. 

Aubert  was  the  typical  Gascon — a  man  of  exuberant 
verbosity,  a  boaster,  with  all  the  Meridional  enthusiasm 
for  what  Daudet  used  to  call  the  magnificent  lie,  loud  in 
self-glorification,  loud  in  dress,  loud  of  voice.  At  the 
same  time  he  was  a  man  of  very  poor  physique  ;  he  was 
afflicted  with  a  kind  of  St.  Vitus'  dance,  and  had  a 
curious  habit — a  tic  nerveux — of  jerking  his  head  to  the 
right,  as  though  looking  over  his  shoulder.  Lombroso 
might  have  found  for  this  habit  a  psychological  ex- 
planation. He  was  a  man  of  no  courage,  and  altogether 
the  very  last  man  that  I  should  have  suspected  to  be 
capable  of  the  deed  of  cruel  violence  of  which  he  was 
afterwards  convicted.  He  appeared  to  me  to  be  a  silly, 
vain  fellow,  too  weak  to  be  dangerous  or  even  offensive ; 
and  though  friends  warned  me  against  his  acquaintance,  I 
took  pleasure  in  his  boastful  talk,  and  the  extraordinary 
powers  of  imagination  which  he  displayed.  At  that  time, 
it  appeared,  he  was  drawing  large  sums  of  money  from 
his  mother,  a  poor  old  peasant  proprietor  of  vineyards  in 
the  St.  Julien  district.    He  had  imagined   for  the  purpose 


28  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

of  deceiving  her.  an  optician,  whom  he  had  christened 
Charles  Daubincourt.  and  whom  he  had  endowed  with 
a  prosperous  business  on  the  Boulevard  St.  Germain. 
It  was  in  Monsieur  Daubincourt's  shop  that  the 
widow  at  the  vinegrower's  farm  near  St.  Julien  was, 
at  the  suggestion  and  through  the  agency  of  her 
younger  son,  investing  her  capital. 

One  day  Aubert  announced  to  us  at  the  table  dlwte 
that  he  was  taking  a  cafd  in  the  Rue  des  Ecoles,  that  he 
had  engaged  to  superintend  the  kitchen  there  an  ex- 
chef  to  the  Emperor  Maximilien,  that  his  wines  would  be 
from  his  own  vineyards  in  the  Medoc  district,  and  that 
he  hoped  that  we  would  bestow  our  patronage  on  his 
establishment.  He  spent  a  considerable  sum  on  having 
the  f^y^  re-painted,  decorated,  and  furnished,  and  obtained 
large  supplies  of  liquor  of  every  kind.  The  enterprise 
only  lasted  a  fortnight.  None  of  his  Latin  Quarter 
customers  ever  paid  their  scot  ;  the  ex-chef  to  Emperor 
Maximilian  was  continuously  intoxicated ;  the  general 
public  avoided  the  house.  One  day  the  shutters  of  the 
Cafe  de  Bordeaux  were  not  taken  down  ;  an  ironical 
notice  to  the  effect  that  the  house  was  "  Fermee  Pour 
Cause  de  Mariage  "  appeared  on  the  door.  It  transpired 
afterwards  that  the  funds  which  had  been  embarked 
in  this  disastrous  speculation  had  been  obtained  from 
Madame  Aubert  on  her  son's  representation  that  by 
investing  a  certain  sum  in  Monsieur  Daubincourt's 
business  he  would  be  taken  into  partnership,  and  he  had 
added  that  as  it  was  his  intention  to  ask  for  the  hand 
of  the  optician's  only  daughter,  Mademoiselle  Cecile 
Daubincourt,  the  day  would  not  be  far  distant  when,  the 
optician  having  retired  to  the  country,  he  would  be  sole 
proprietor  of  this   flourishing   business. 

I  saw  Aubert  shortly  after   the  failure  of  the   Caf6 


MY   FRIEND,   THE    MURDERER         29 

de  Bordeaux.       He  was  then  engaged  in  avoiding  his 
creditors,  and,  notably,  the  butcher  who  had  suppHed  the 
meat  for  the  table  d'hote.      He  told  me  that  this  butcher 
was  very   angry,  and  had  been  threatening  all  kinds  of 
vengeance  ;  "  but,"  he  consoled  himself,  "  he  has  never 
killed  anybody."      I    think   these  words  had  a    singular 
significance  in  the  mouth  of  a  man  who  was  a  potential 
murderer,  and  I  can  imagine  the  extension  which    the 
genius  of  a  De  Quincey  could  have  given  to  the  phrase. 
It  was  some  years  before  I  met  Aubert  again.     He 
had  been  living,  he  told  me,  in  the   South  of  France. 
He  expressed    great  repentance   for  the   errors   of  his 
youth,  and  told  me  that  he  had  made  full  reparation  to 
his  mother.     He  was  Gaudissart  still ;  he  still  dressed 
in  extravagant  fashion,  but  his  demeanour  was  quieter, 
and  his  wish  to  do  well  in  a  virtuous  and  orderly  course 
of  life  so  impressed  me  that   I   did   not  discourage  his 
visits.       He    took    advantage    of    my    friendly    feelings 
towards   him  to   sell    me   a   barrel    of  St.    Julien  wine, 
vintaged,  as  he  told  me,  on  his  own  vineyards.      It  was 
a  wine,  I  was  informed,  which  would  vastly  improve  in 
bottle,  and  he  persuaded  me  to  leave  it  untouched  for 
more  than  a  year.      I  may  add  that  when  at  last  I  opened 
one    of    these   bottles,    I    discovered   that    a   sour    and 
abominable  concoction   had  been   foisted  upon  me,  and 
I  understood  why  he  had  tried,  with  all  his  Meridional 
arts  of  persuasion,  to  induce  me  to  leave  this  claret  until 
at  least  five  years  of  maturing  in  bottle  should  have  added 
greatly  to  its  bouquet. 

Some  time  after  we  had  met  again  he  offered  to  pilot 
me  in  the  South  of  France,  and  together  we  visited  Dax, 
Bayonne,  Biarritz,  and  the  Landes.  I  remember  walking 
with  him  late  one  night  through  the  thick  pine-forest 
which   separates  the  little   seaside   village  of  Capbreton 


30  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

from  the  Paris  hioh-road.  He  was  aware  that  I  had  that 
afternoon  received  at  a  bank  at  Bayonne  a  considerable 
sum  of  money,  and  that  I  was  carrying  it  in  my  pocket. 
As  it  afterwards  transpired,  his  affairs  were  at  that  time 
in  a  disastrous  condition,  and  I  had  often  wondered 
why  it  was  that  during  that  midnight  walk  through  the 
silence  and  gloom  of  this  forest,  he  kept  insisting  that 
I  should  walk  ahead  of  him.  I  have  to-day,  no  doubt, 
that  he  had  formed  some  designs  against  me  and  my 
money,  but  that  his  courage  failed  him.  I  was  carrying 
a  makhila,  one  of  those  heavy,  loaded  Basque  walking- 
sticks  which  contain  a  lance,  and  he  may  have  concluded 
that  an  encounter  with  me  might  not  be  successful. 

On  reaching  Capbreton,  we  found  that  the  one  inn  in 
the  place  was  so  full  that  we  could  only  be  accommodated 
with  a  double-bedded  room.  I  passed  that  night  in  the 
same  room  as  a  man  who  was  afterwards  convicted  of 
two  murders,  perpetrated  under  circumstances  of  peculiar 
atrocity,  and  in  both  cases  with  such  a  petty  motive  of 
robbery  that  the  general  opinion  was  that  he  must  have 
had  a  long  familiarity  with  crime.  But,  as  I  have  said, 
I  had  never  had  the  least  suspicion  of  the  things  of  which 
he  was  capable.  He  hung  out  no  danger  signals  that 
were  intelligible  to  me,  though,  if  at  that  time  I  had  been 
a  student  of  Lombroso,  I  might  have  taken  warning  from 
one  or  two  of  his  peculiarities.  For  one  thing,  in  signing 
his  name  he  made  a  most  elaborate  and  complicated 
flourish  to  his  signature,  and  this,  Lombroso  tells  us,  is 
a  distinct  sign  of  moral  degeneracy.  In  the  extraordinary 
letter  which  I  annex  to  this  chapter — extraordinary 
because  of  the  quite  unwarranted  warmth  of  the  feeling 
expressed — the  student  of  graphology  will  find  such  a 
signature  as  is  adverted  to  by  the  Italian  criminologist. 

I  was  so  charmed  with  the  village  of  Capbreton  that 


A   MURDERER'S   AUTOGRAPH  : 


-i^^^ 


yi'v^ 


■/-^^c^ 


32  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

I  remained  there  for  uiiwards  of  one  year,  only  leaving 
it  to  accompany  Zola,  at  his  request,  on  his  first  visit  to 
England.  Aubert  returned  to  Paris,  and  I  only  saw  him 
at  rare  intervals  afterwards.  He  was  then  in  business 
as  wine  merchant  on  the  Boulevard  des  Filles  de 
Calvaire,  and  used  to  drive  about  Paris  in  a  gig,  which 
was  not  the  only  point  of  resemblance  between  him  and 
Probert,  one  of  the  murderers  of  Mr.  William  Weare. 
I  next  heard  that  he  had  been  sold  up,  had  abandoned 
the  wine  trade,  and  was  frequently  to  be  seen  at  the 
Halle  aux  Timbres,  a  place  where  collectors  of  and 
dealers  in  postage-stamps  assemble  for  the  purposes  of 
their  trade. 

It  is  a  well-known  fact  that  criminals,  having  selected 
some  branch  of  their  nefarious  business,  some  speciality 
in  crime,  usually  remain  faithful  to  their  selection.  The 
man  who  has  once  been  convicted  for  stealing  boots  will 
probably  steal  boots  again,  and  during  the  course  of  his 
criminal  career  little  else  but  boots.  Poor  Bibi-la-Pur^e 
had  a  weakness  for  stealing  umbrellas.  Lacenaire's 
invariable  method  was  to  issue  bills  of  exchange,  and  to 
await  the  bank  clerk  for  the  purpose  of  assassination. 
Courvoisier  and  Thurtell  before  him  had  mapped  out 
a  career  in  which  a  succession  of  crimes  were  to  be 
carried  out  in  precisely  the  same  manner.  It  is  as 
though  crime  were,  in  a  large  degree,  a  monomania. 

The  universal  geniuses  of  criminality  are  the  ex- 
ception. Even  Jack-the-Ripper,  of  notorious  memory, 
was  uniform  in  his  methods.  One  might  parody  the 
French  saying,  and  declare  that  "  Le  crime  naquit  un 
jour  de  symmetrie." 

Aubert  had  decided  to  make  a  living  for  himself  and 
his  female  associate,  Marguerite  Dubois,  by  stealing 
postage-stamp   collections.     He  was  totally  ignorant  of 


AUBERT  AND  THE  INSURANCE  CLERK  v. 


v30 


the  different  values  of  rare  foreign  stamps ;  he  was  a 
philatelist  only  in  this  sense,  that  he  knew  that  good 
prices  could  be  obtained  for  certain  specimens.  He 
seems  from  the  very  first  to  have  made  up  his  mind  to 
possess  himself  of  these  articles  of  commerce  by  any  and 
every  means  in  his  power. 

Some  time  after  his  conviction  I  met  in  the  Luxem- 
bourg Gardens  a  clerk  in  an  insurance  office,  whose 
acquaintance  I  had  made  at  the  table  d'hote  in  the  Rue 
Champollion,  where  I  also  first  had  met  Joseph  Aubert. 
Some  time  before  the  murder  of  young  Delahaef,  Aubert 
had  called  on  him  one  night,  and  had  told  him  that  he 
had  recently  become  an  ardent  philatelist.  The  purpose 
of  his  visit,  so  he  explained  to  Dames,  the  insurance 
clerk,  was  to  examine  his  collection.  After  Dames,  with 
some  pride,  had  shown  him  the  treasures  he  possessed, 
Aubert  began  to  ask  him  about  his  financial  position. 
Dames  told  him  that  he  had  some  stock,  and  that  he 
kept  the  bonds  in  his  trunk,  together  with  his  stamp 
album.  His  visitor  tried  to  impress  on  him  that  it  was 
imprudent  to  do  so,  and  warmly  recommended  him  to 
hire  a  safe  in  one  of  the  banking  establishments. 

In  this  way  the  time  passed  away ;  and  suddenly 
Aubert,  pulling  out  his  watch,  exclaimed  with  much 
annoyance:  "It  is  past  twelve.  The  last  omnibus  to 
the  Avenue  de  Versailles  has  gone  long  ago.  It  will 
be  quite  impossible  for  me  to  limp  all  that  way  home, 
Dames ;  you  will  have  to  put  me  up  for  the  night." 

**  I  do  not  know  how  it  was,"  so  Dames  declared 
to  me  in  relating  this  story;  "but  before  Aubert  had 
finished  speaking,  the  feeling  came  over  me  that  I  must 
get  rid  of  the  man  at  any  cost ;  that  for  no  consideration 
must  I  allow  him  to  pass  the  night  in  my  room.  I  had 
no  reason  whatever  to  suspect  him  of  any  evil  designs. 

3 


34  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

I  had  always  known  him  Hush  ot  money,  and  imat^incd 
him  to  be  still  in  a  very  prosperous  situation.  But  the 
feeling  was  there,  and  I  could  not  shake  it  off  nor 
reason  myself  out  of  the  horrible  premonition  which 
had  beset  me.  I  at  once  told  him  that  it  was  quite 
impossible  for  him  to  pass  the  night  in  my  room.  I 
invented  a  variety  of  excuses  to  explain  my  refusal ;  and 
as  he  continued  to  claini  my  hospitality,  on  the  ground 
that  it  was  too  far  for  him  to  walk,  and  that,  having  left 
his  purse  at  home,  he  was  unable  to  take  a  cab,  I  gave 
him  three  francs  with  which  to  pay  his  fare.  I  am  quite 
certain  that  that  premonition  saved  my  life.  He  had 
come  with  no  other  purpose  than  to  rob  me  of  my  stamp 
collection  and  my  savings,  and  his  subsequent  conduct 
shows  that  he  w-ould  have  recoiled  before  no  means  of 
effecting  his  purpose. 

"  On  reaching  home  the  next  evening  from  my  office, 
my  concierge  expressed  great  surprise  at  seeing  me.  It 
appeared  that  that  morning,  shortly  after  I  had  left  the 
house,  she  had  received  a  telegram,  purporting  to  be 
signed  by  me,  in  which  I  announced  to  her  that  I  had 
been  sent  on  a  business  journey,  and  directed  her  to 
hand  my  trunk  to  a  cabman  who  would  come  to  fetch 
it.  The  cabman  had  duly  arrived  ;  my  trunk  had  been 
handed  over.  It  came  out  afterwards  that  the  telecrram 
had  been  written  by  Aubert,  who  was  in  waiting  at  the 
Gare  du  Nord  to  receive  my  trunk.  He  took  it  into 
a  private  room  in  one  of  the  cafds  on  the  Boulevard 
Denain,  where  he  broke  it  open.  The  bonds  he  sold 
immediately  at  an  exchange  office  opposite  to  the  caf^, 
and  my  precious  postage  stamps  were  disposed  of  after- 
wards at  ridiculous  prices  at  the  Halle  aux  Timbres." 


CHAPTER    III 

A  Murderer's  Kindness  to  Animals — Aubert  at  the  Bull-fight — The  Killing 
of  Delahaef — "The  Ayenbite  of  Inwyt" — Aubert's  Trial— A  Letter  from 
the  lies  du  Salut — The  Guiana  Convict  Settlement — The  Devil's  Island 
as  an  Earthly  Paradise — French  Presidents  and  the  Death  Penalty — 
Executions  in  Paris — The  Court  of  Appeal  and  its  Limitations — A 
Two-Edged  Sword — The  Case  of  Madame  Groetzinger. 

ONE  of  the  traits  of  Aubert's  character  was  a 
kindness  to  animals.  This  characteristic  has 
been  often  noticed  in  those  who  have  no  kindness  for 
their  fellow-creatures.  At  the  time  of  his  arrest  at 
Cherbourg  he  was  travelling  with  two  pet  cats,  to  whose 
subsequent  fate  he  seemed  to  attach  more  importance 
than  to  that  of  Marguerite  Dubois.  When  we  were  in 
the  South  of  France  together  I  accompanied  him  to 
the  first  bull-fight  which  I  have  seen,  and  I  was  much 
pleased  to  find  that  he  shared  the  indignation  that  I 
felt  at  the  horrors  which  we  there  witnessed.  This 
was  all  the  more  creditable  in  him  that  people  in  the 
South  of  France — and  Aubert  was  by  birth  a  Southerner 
— seem  entirely  unable  to  comprehend  the  humanitarian 
outcry  which  has  been  raised  against  the  introduction 
of  bull-fighting  into  France  by  the  Frenchmen  of  the 
North.  They  set  these  objections  down  to  hypocrisy, 
or  to  a  wish  to  dictate  to  the  South,  or  to  a  desire  fi3r 
self-advertisement. 

At  the  time   of  the   bull-fight  which   I   attended   in 
Aubert's  company,  Madame  Severine,  of  Paris,  had  been 

35 


36  TWENTY   YFARS    IN    PARIS 

writing  in  her  most  vigorous  style  aqainst  these  brutal 
and  heathen  displays.  The  indignation  against  her 
amongst  the  aficionados  of  Bayonne  was  very  great,  rmd 
after  the  corrida  was  over,  the  less  noble  parts  of  one 
of  the  slaughtered  bulls  were  cut  off,  and  were  forwarded 
by  postal  packet  to  the  humane  lady  in  Paris.  That 
a  number  of  Frenchmen  of  the  rank  of  gentlemen 
should  have  acted  in  such  a  way  where  a  woman  was 
concerned  showed  how  intense  was  their  feeling  about 
the  injustice  of  Madame  Severine's  comments  on  their 
conduct  and  sportsmanship,  and  gave  evidence  of  the 
complete  difference  in  the  psychologies  of  South  and 
North.  I  have  always  thought  that  Aubert,  by  setting 
his  opinion  against  that  of  the  people  of  his  part  of 
France,  showed  that  he  had  some  instincts  of  good  in 
him — a  circumstance  which  I  did  not  forget  when  the 
time  came. 

As  far  as  the  police  were  able  to  establish  it,  the 
first  murder  which  Joseph  Aubert  committed  was  the 
assassination  of  a  banker  at  Mons  in  Belgium,  who  had 
incurred  his  anger  by  suing  him  on  a  protested  bill  of 
exchange.  During  the  carnival  in  Mons  this  banker 
was  stabbed  to  death  by  a  masked  man  who  was 
disguised  in  a  black  domino.  When  he  was  taxed  with 
this  murder  during  his  trial  for  the  killing  of  young 
Delahaef,  Aubert  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  said, 
"  The  man  was  an  arrant  canaille ;  what  is  the  use  of 
bothering  me  about  him  ? " 

It  is  quite  certain  that  nobody  who  had  not  served 
some  apprenticeship  in  the  practice  of  murder  could 
so  cunningly  have  devised  or  so  coldly  carried  out  the 
crime  of  which  he  was  convicted.  The  motive  of  this 
murder  was  the  plunder  of  a  collection  of  postage  stamps. 
Aubert  had  made  the  acquaintance  of  Delahaef,  a  weak, 


THE    MURDER   OF    DELAHAEF  37 

crippled  youth,  at  the  Halle  aux  Timbres,  and  had 
learned  that  he  possessed  a  valuable  album  of  stamps. 
He  set  himself  to  obtain  this  album.  He  first  fixed  a 
rendezvous  with  Delahaef  in  a  room  in  a  hotel  in  the 
Rue  du  Mail,  which  he  had  hired  for  the  purpose.  The 
young  collector,  however,  failed  to  keep  the  appointment, 
and  thus  prolonged  his  life  by  a  few  days. 

Unfortunately  he  was  more  exact  on  the  second 
occasion,  and  duly  betook  himself  with  his  collection 
to  Aubert's  small  flat  in  the  Avenue  de  Versailles. 
Exactly  what  occurred  here  will  never  be  known  ; 
but  the  theory  of  the  prosecution  was  that  Aubert 
attacked  him  from  behind  while  he  was  bending  over 
his  collection,  and  with  one  terrible  blow  from  a 
hatchet  stretched  him  dead  on  the  floor.  Marguerite 
Dubois  stated  that  on  entering  the  flat  some  minutes 
after  Delahaef's  arrival  she  found  the  young  man  lying 
dead,  and  that  Aubert,  pointing  to  him  with  a 
gesture  of  triumph,  exclaimed,  "  We  quarrelled,  we 
fought,  and  the  victor's  palms  remained  to  the  stronger." 
He  then  asked  the  girl  to  help  him  to  pack  the  body  up 
in  a  trunk  which  he  had  prepared  for  the  purpose  ;  but 
Marguerite  declined,  and  sat  reading  a  pink  edition  of 
some  Court  lady's  Lettres  d' Amour,  whilst  Aubert 
carried  out  his  sinister  preparations  for  concealing 
the  body. 

The  sangfroid  displayed  by  this  weakly  man  showed 
him  to  be  one  of  the  most  determined  crimitials  who 
ever  lived.  After  the  body  had  been  corded  up  in  the 
trunk  he  went  for  a  porter,  and  had  the  box  carried  to 
a  packing  warehouse,  where  by  his  directions  a  strong 
wooden  case  was  built  round  it.  While  this  was  going 
on,  Aubert  sat  in  the  workshop,  chatting  with  the  men 
and  smoking  cigarettes.     As  soon  as  the  case  was  ready 


38  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

ho  went  for  I\Iaro;^ucritc,  and  drove  off  widi  her  in  a 
four-wheeler,  with  the  huq^c  case  on  the  top  of  the  cab. 
It  was  deposed  by  the  cabman  that  at  the  Gare 
St.  Lazare  Aubert  showed  great  reluctance  to  help  him 
to  lift  the  box  to  the  ground.  This  gave  the  presiding 
judge  the  opportunity  of  making  the  sage  remark  to  the 
prisoner,  "  You  have  heard  of  the  danger  of  anatomical 
wounds,  and  were  afraid  of  the  danger  of  blood- 
poisoning  if  you  pricked  your  finger  with  a  splinter  of 
the  rough  wood  which  enclosed  the  corpse  of  your 
victim."  Aubert's  prudence  in  this  respect  could  hardly 
be  considered  an  aggravating  circumstance,  although  it 
certainly  did  show  how  completely  he  was  master  of 
himself 

His  sinister  luggage  Aubert  deposited  at  the  cloak- 
room of  a  small  station  outside  of  Cherbourg,  and  then 
proceeded  with  Marguerite  to  look  for  a  villa  near  the 
seaside.  Here,  again,  premonition  seems  to  have  warred 
against  his  purposes,  I  heard  that  more  than  one  person 
to  whom  the  couple  addressed  themselves  refused  at  the 
mere  sight  of  them  to  accept  them  as  tenants.  It  is 
true  that  Aubert  expressed  great  anxiety  to  know  if 
the  sea  in  front  of  these  houses  was  very  deep.  His 
purpose  was,  of  course,  to  convey  the  box  there  across 
country,  and  either  to  sink  it  bodily  into  the  water  or 
to  dispose  of  the  corpse  piecemeal.  In  the  meanwhile 
(and  here,  again,  the  general  observations  on  the  conduct 
of  guilty  men  exemplify  themselves)  he  was  frequently 
seen  at  the  small  station  where  he  had  left  the  trunk. 
He  used  to  come  there  with  a  return  ticket,  and 
depart  by  the  next  train  that  went  in  the  direction  of 
Cherbourg. 

Soon,   however,    the   inevitable   happened,    and   the 
attention  of  the  station-master  was  drawn  to  the  big  box 


"THE   AYENBITE    OF    INWYT"  39 

in  the  cloakroom.  It  was  opened  ;  the  gendarmes  were 
sent  for ;  and,  on  his  next  conscience-impelled  visit, 
Aubert  was  arrested.  The  Paris  police  were  able  at 
once  to  identify  the  victim,  for  some  days  past,  at  the 
request  of  Delahaef's  greatly  alarmed  family,  a  search 
after  the  young  man  had  been  begun.  Delahaef  was  a 
quiet  youth,  who  lived  with  his  parents,  and  what  first 
aroused  in  their  mind  a  terrible  suspicion  that  some  foul 
play  had  been  dealt  out  to  him  was  the  receipt,  the  day 
of  the  tragedy  in  the  Avenue  de  Versailles,  of  a  telegram 
purporting  to  come  from  him  couched  in  the  following 
terms  :  "  Adieu.  I  am  leaving  for  Folkestone,  where  I 
intend  to  embark  for  Chicago." 

When  I  heard  of  this  horrible  affair,  it  seemed  to 
me  inconceivable  that  the  Joseph  Aubert  whom  I  had 
known  could  have  acted  in  such  a  manner,  and  I  wrote 
at  once  to  him  in  his  prison  at  Mazas  to  tell  him  this. 
In  his  answer  he  neither  denied  nor  admitted  his  guilt, 
but  contented  himself  with  saying  "that  his  aftair  was 
progressing  very  satisfactorily." 

Shortly  after  this  letter  I  received  another  from 
Maitre  Henri  Robert,  in  compliance  with  whose  request 
I  wrote  down  all  the  good  things  that  I  knew  of  Aubert's 
character.  I  said,  amongst  other  things,  that  here  was 
a  provincial  whom  Paris  had  devoured  physically  as  well 
as  morally.  It  was,  by  the  way,  on  Aubert's  physical 
degeneracy  that  his  counsel  more  particularly  based  his 
most  eloquent  appeal  to  the  mercy  of  the  jury  ;  and,  it 
must  be  said,  Aubert  very  cleverly  acted  the  part  in 
the  dock  of  a  man  who  by  the  abuse  of  morphine  had 
entirely  destroyed  his  powers.  He  howled  for  morphine 
whenever  the  President  put  to  him  some  probing  and 
fatal  question  ;  he  flung  himself  about  in  the  dock  like 
a  madman  ;  his  screams  echoed   over  all  the  Palais  de 


40  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Justice.     "Oh!  what  I  am  suti'ering  !  "  ("  Oh  !  ce  que  je 
souftrc !  ")  wiis  the  burden  of  his  cries. 

It  was  an  abominable  comedy,  a  piece  of  impudent 
Gascon  dupery  ;  but  it  was  skilfully  carried  out,  and,  I 
Hmcy.  greatly  contributed  to  the  favourable  result.  At 
the  same  time,  no  doubt,  the  jury  were  influenced  by 
the  fact  that  only  a  week  or  two  previously  a  woman 
had  been  released  from  prison,  where  she  had  been  lying 
for  years  under  a  conviction  for  murder.  A  judicial 
error  had  been  committed  ;  the  woman  was  innocent. 
Monsieur  Robert  took  full  advantage  of  the  incident 
to  impress  on  the  jurymen  the  danger  of  convicting 
capitally,  and  in  the  end,  to  the  indignation  of  Paris  and 
the  outcry  of  the  papers,  Joseph  Aubert,  benefiting  by 
an  admission  of  extenuating  circumstances,  escaped  with 
a  sentence  of  penal  servitude  for  life. 

I  heard  from  him  directly  after  his  conviction.  He 
wrote  in  a  very  cheerful  spirit,  and  was  evidently 
delighted  at  the  success  of  the  ruse  by  which  he,  the 
Gascon,  had  deceived  the  Parisians,  who  fancy  them- 
selves so  exceptionally  clever.  He  asked  me  to  send 
him  some  books,  and  enclosed  a  list  of  works  of  light 
literature  which  he  desired  to  receive. 

Some  months  later  I  heard  from  his  brother  that  he 
had  been  removed  to  the  convict  depot  at  the  He  de  Re, 
and  that  it  would  now  be  impossible  for  him  to  write  to 
me  direct.  His  message  to  me  was,  that  he  would  be 
much  obliged  if  I  would  send  him  "three  singlets 
of  white  flannel  and  two  or  three  pairs  of  long  stock- 
ings in  laine  p2ire  d'Aicstralie,  which  could  be  obtained 
in  London,  and  which  were  considered  good  for 
rheumatism." 

I  was  interested  by  the  unconsciousness  displayed 
by  this  communication,  and   there   was  also  subject  for 


A   LETTER   FROM  THE    BAGNIO        41 

reflection  in  the  care  of  himself  shown  by  one  who  had 
had  so  Httle  heed  of  the  sufferings  of  others.  Indeed, 
the  whole  story  of  Joseph  Aubert,  repulsive  as  it  was, 
presented  a  rich  field  for  psychological  observation,  and 
this  must  be  my  excuse  for  the  extension  which  I  have 
given  to  it  in  these  pages. 

I  was  to  hear  from  him  again  after  his  transportation. 
In  1899,  at  a  time  when  the  Dreyfus  affair  was  at  its 
height,  and  one  was  hearing  much  talk  about  the  penal 
settlement  at  the  lies  du  Salut,  I  received  a  letter  from 
French  Guiana  bearing  the  postmark  of  St.  Laurent  du 
Maroni.  This  letter  came  from  Joseph  Aubert.  It  had 
been  written,  he  told  me,  "  by  the  vacillating  light  of 
a  candle  as  I  lie  stretched  on  the  floor  of  the  sleeping- 
shed."  He  informed  me  that  he  had  come  to  the  con- 
clusion that  it  was  impossible  for  a  person  of  his  physical 
weakness  to  escape  from  Guiana  by  the  overland  route, 
that  is  to  say,  through  the  French,  Dutch,  and  British 
settlements  into  Venezuela,  and  that  he  had  decided  on 
taking  ship  for  Europe  and  liberty.  He  asked  me  to 
send  him  by  postal  packet  a  further  supply  of  singlets, 
"  into  the  sleeves  of  which  you  will  have  taken  the 
precaution  to  insert  four  banknotes  for  one  hundred 
francs  each,  which  will  be  preferable  to  a  cheque.  With 
this  sum  and  one  thousand  francs  which  my  brother  has 
promised  me  I  shall  be  able  to  accept  the  offer  of  a 
worthy  citizen  of  this  town,  who  undertakes  for  that 
payment  to  smuggle  me  on  board  a  sailing  vessel.  I 
cannot  get  more  than  a  thousand  francs  from  my  family, 
who,  just  now,  are  on  somewhat  cold  terms  with  me." 
He  added  that  in  recognition  of  the  service  rendered  to 
him  by  an  Englishman,  he  would  settle  in  England  and 
devote  himself  to  a  literary  career.  As  to  France,  his 
native  land,  he  turned  his  back  on  her  for  ever.     She 


42  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

had  acted  too  badly  towards  him.  He  concluded  by 
urging  me  once  more  to  assist  him  to  escape  from  that 
earthly  hell,  French  Guiana.  The  letter  was  not  signed 
except  with  initials,  and  the  fact  that  it  had  safely  reached 
its  destination  gave  one  food  for  reflection.  I  half 
suspected  a  trap  laid  by  the  gardes-chiourme  or 
warders  ;  but  before  I  could  make  further  inquiries,  I 
heard  that  Joseph  Aubert  had  died.  The  regime  had 
killed  one  more  convict,  and  to  his  body  had  been 
accorded  the  Cayenne  funeral.  Almost  every  evening 
from  the  lies  du  Salut  a  skiff  emerges  into  the  waves. 
One,  two,  or  more  stark,  unshrouded  corpses  are  thrown 
overboard  ;  the  shimmering  swarm  of  sharks  does  the 
rest. 

Marguerite  Dubois,  who  was  found  guilty  of  receiving 
stolen  property,  knowing  it  to  be  stolen — Aubert  had 
presented  her  with  a  bracelet  out  of  the  proceeds  of  poor 
Delahaef's  collection  of  postage  stamps — was  sentenced 
to  three  years'  imprisonment.  Her  conduct  was  good, 
and  she  benefited  by  a  reduction  of  her  sentence,  so  that 
only  eighteen  months  after  her  conviction  she  was  once 
again  walking  the  streets  of  Paris. 

For  all  but  the  strongest  convicts  Guiana  proves  itself 
a  "  dry  guillotine."  If  recent  revelations  can  be  believed, 
the  treatment  of  the  prisoners  at  the  penal  settlement  of 
Cayenne  is  incredibly  barbarous.  The  food  is  abomin- 
able. An  anarchist  who  served  a  sentence  of  five  years 
on  the  lies  du  Salut,  stated  in  his  account  of  his  prison 
life,  which  was  published  some  time  ago  in  Le  Journal, 
that  during  the  whole  time  that  he  was  a  prisoner  he  ate 
nothing  but  bread.  The  other  rations  consist  of  mouldy 
beans  and  lentils,  and  all  the  tinned  meats  which  have 
been  rejected  as  unfit  for  food  by  the  military  and  naval 
commissariats.     The  punishments  are  incredibly  severe. 


THE   DEVIL'S    ISLAND  43 

Botany  Bay  in  its  worst  days  compared  favourably  with 
Cayenne  in  the  twentieth  century.  Aubert  was  right  in 
speaking  of  his  prison  as  a  hell  on  earth.  The  morale 
of  the  bagne  seems  as  bad  as  ever  it  was  at  Toulon 
or  at  Brest.  The  climate  is  described  as  deadly,  and  of 
course  of  the  reputation  of  the  islands  in  this  respect 
much  use  was  made  at  the  time  by  the  people  who  were 
invoking  compassion  for  the  fate  of  Captain  Dreyfus.  I 
am  not  certain  that  the  lies  du  Salut  merit  so  bad  a 
name  in  this  respect. 

Bernard  Lazare  once  lent  me  a  pamphlet  about 
the  Devil's  Island  which  gave  quite  a  different  account 
of  the  place.  Its  name,  so  ominous  in  sound,  did 
not  proceed  from  the  physical  horrors  of  the  island. 
It  had  been  called  so  because  at  one  time  a  refractory 
prisoner,  who  was  known  as  "  the  devil "  in  the 
penal  settlement  on  the  He  Royale  was  marooned 
there.  The  pamphlet  to  which  I  refer,  placed  in  my 
hands  by  Captain  Dreyfus's  most  ardent  partisan,  was 
written  by  one  of  the  victims  of  the  Coup  d'Etat,  one 
Henri  Chabanne,  known  as  "  le  Nivernais  Noble 
CcEur,"  who  spent  some  years  onthe  Devil's  Island. 
He  gives  an  idyllic  description  of  its  natural  beauties,  of 
the  freshness  of  the  sea  breezes,  of  the  warbling  of  the 
birds  in  the  trees,  and  he  concludes  by  saying  :  "  J'y 
^prouvai  tant  de  douces  emotions,  que  j'ai  dit  cent 
fois  que  c'etait  le  futur  paradis  du  monde."  ^  The  regime, 
the  enforced  and  excessive  labour,  the  almost  total 
absence  of  sanitary  precautions,  however,  account  for 
the  terrible  mortality  amongst  the  convicts.  "  Marche 
ou  creve"  ("Work  or  rot")  is  the  alternative  given  to  the 

^  "  I  experienced  there  so  many  sweet  emotions,  that  I  said  a 
hundred  times  that  this  place"  (the  Devil's  Island)  "was  the  future 
earthly  Paradise." 


44  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

forfais  in  the  labour  gangs,  and  most  of  them  succumb 
miserably  lon^j  before  their  sentences  have  been  worked 
out.  These  wretched  circumstances  are  unfortunately 
not  known  to  the  classes  from  which,  in  France, 
criminals  are  mainly  recruited.  The  idea  prevails  that 
Guiana  is  a  very  pleasant  place,  and  that  the  lot  of  the 
transported  convict  is  only  one  degree  inferior  to  that 
of  the  State-aided  emigrant. 

Amongst  the  roughs  of  Paris  one  hears  the  expression 
of  most  extraordinary  notions  about  the  penal  settlement. 
It  is  generally  imagined  that  it  is  a  place  where  all  the 
trees  are  red,  which  is  peopled  by  aboriginal  women  of 
the  greatest  charm  and  beauty,  and  where  gold  and 
precious  stones  may  be  picked  up  off  the  earth  in  the 
greatest  profusion.  The  national,  total  ignorance  of 
geography  strips  the  remoteness  of  the  place  of  exile 
of  all  the  horrors  that  used  to  haunt  the  English  criminal 
at  the  mere  thought  of  Australia.  The  chances  of  being 
executed  for  murder,  owing  to  the  leniency  of  the  jury 
and  the  reluctance  of  the  President  to  refuse  a  reprieve, 
being  known  to  be  small,  the  alternative  of  transportation 
for  life  by  no  means  terrifies  the  French  criminal  ;  so 
little,  indeed,  that  many  murders  have  been  committed 
in  France  with  no  other  motive  than  to  qualify  for  this 
form  of  emigration.  "  I  have  led  a  miserable  life 
in  Paris,  often  without  food  and  without  a  shelter,  and 
any  change  in  my  circumstances  can  only  be  an  improve- 
ment. I  want  to  be  sent  to  the  colonies,  and  I  committed 
the  crime  with  which  I  am  charged  so  as  to  force  the 
Government  to  provide  for  my  future." 

Disillusionment  commences  for  the  poor  wretches 
the  moment  after  they  have  embarked  at  the  He  de  Re, 
when  they  first  come  under  the  discipline  of  the  colonial 
penitentiary  warders.     These  enforce  their  orders  with 


THE    DRY   GUILLOTINE  45 

a  bludgeon,  and  can  oppose  the  slightest  attempt  at 
revolt  with  sabre  or  revolver.  A  sentence  of  five  years 
in  the  bagnio  of  Cayenne  is  equivalent  to  a  sentence 
of  death,  slow  and  lingering,  but  almost  inevitable. 
Possibly  this  fact  is  taken  into  consideration  by  the 
juries  when  they  pass  verdicts  which  do  not  allow  of 
a  sentence  of  immediate  death,  and  if  this  be  so  their 
apparent  clemency  is  masked  severity.  I  have  no  doubt 
that  the  President,  when  against  the  advice  of  the 
Committee  of  Pardons  he  reprieves  a  prisoner  sentenced 
to  death  by  the  guillotine,  feels  that  it  is  but  a  poor 
grace  that  he  is  extending  to  the  wretched  man.  Many  of 
the  scores  of  murderers  who  were  reprieved  by  President 
Grevy  must  have  lived  to  regret  his  instinctive  horror 
of  the  death  penalty,  a  trait  in  his  character  which  had 
won  for  him  among  the  criminal  classes  the  nickname 
of  "  Papa  Gratias." 

President  Carnot  allowed  himself  to  be  guided  by  all 
the  circumstances  of  the  case.  I  was  told  at  the  Elysee 
on  the  occasion  of  one  of  my  visits  there  that  the 
President  often  spent  the  whole  night  over  the  dossier 
of  a  prisoner  under  sentence  of  death,  reading  over 
every  paper  in  the  case  with  the  greatest  attention. 
One  fine  afternoon  in  the  summer,  when  I  was  visiting 
the  President's  private  apartments  in  the  left  wing  of 
Fontainebleau  Palace,  I  was  told  by  the  military  attache 
that  he  was  forced  to  hurry  me  through  the  various 
rooms  because,  contrary  to  his  usual  custom  when  en 
vilUgiature,  Monsieur  Carnot  intended  to  get  back  to  work 
at  an  early  hour  that  afternoon.  "  See  there,"  said  the 
general,  pointing  to  a  huge  bundle  of  papers  which  was 
lying  on  the  President's  table — we  were  in  his  private 
study  at  the  time — "that  is  a  dossier  which  has  just 
come  in  from  the  Ministry  of  Justice,  the  report  of  the 


46  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Committee  of  Pardons  on  X's  petition  for  :i  reprieve. 
The  '  patron  '  never  keeps  such  things  waiting,  and  he 
may  be  here  at  any  minute  to  commence  reading  the 
papers.  It  means  that  he  won't  dine  properly  to-night; 
and  very  probably  when  I  go  to  his  bedroom  to-morrow 
morning  I  shall  find  that  he  has  not  gone  to  bed  nor 
slept  a  wink  all  night.  He  will  still  be  plunged  in  the 
reading  of  these  wretched  papers." 

I  know  that  President  Faure  did  not  take  this  duty 
in  any  degree  as  seriously  as  his  unfortunate  predecessor. 
He  used  generally  to  allow  himself  to  be  guided  by 
the  opinion  of  Paris,  for  he  had  his  personal  popularity 
at  all  times  before  his  eyes.  Monsieur  Loubet  seems 
generally  to  have  deferred  to  the  opinion  expressed  by 
the  Committee  of  Pardons.  Fortunately  for  his  personal 
comfort,  the  circumstance  that  since  the  demolition  of 
the  Roquette  prison  there  has  been  a  difficulty  in  finding 
any  place  for  the  guillotine,  and  that  in  consequence 
executions  have,  de  facto,  been  abolished  in  the  French 
capital,  has  relieved  him  to  some  extent  of  a  painful  and 
responsible  duty. 

It  is  highly  probable  that  before  the  end  of  next 
year  the  Chamber  of  Deputies  will  have  approved  of  a 
law  which  has  already  received  the  sanction  of  the 
Senate,  and  that  public  executions  will  be  abolished  in 
France.  Unless  something  of  the  kind  is  done,  capital 
punishment  may  be  said  to  be  abolished,  at  least  as  far 
as  Paris  is  concerned.  The  inhabitants  of  the  various 
quarters  which  have  been  suggested  as  suitable  places 
for  executions  have  expressed  such  decided  objections  to 
the  proposal  that  for  some  years  past  they  have  been 
able  to  enforce  their  wishes.  The  landlords  in  these 
different  quarters  argue  that  it  must  greatly  reduce  the 
value  of  their  property  to  have  the  guillotine  in  operation 


ON    THE    DEATH-PENALTY  47 

in  their  neighbourhood,  and  under  a  Republican  Govern- 
ment  the   wishes  of  influential  electors  are  paramount. 

For  the  rest,  the  accounts  of  executions  in  Paris 
have  always  been  greatly  exaggerated  with  respect  to 
the  scenes  of  disorder  which  are  alleged  to  have  taken 
place.  At  the  Roquette  the  most  stringent  police  regula- 
tions, and  the  massing  on  the  square  of  a  large  number 
of  troops,  both  on  foot  and  on  horseback,  prevented 
anything  even  approaching  to  a  scandalous  scene.  It 
is  true  that  after  the  guillotine  had  been  removed,  and 
the  troops  had  in  consequence  been  withdrawn,  the 
square  was  invaded  by  a  rush  of  rabble  of  a  very  objec- 
tionable type ;  but  where  the  law  affords  such  disgusting 
spectacles  as  the  slaughter  of  a  human  being,  it  can 
hardly  be  expected  that  the  better  and  humaner  classes 
will  be  represented  amongst  the  spectators. 

My  duties  often  took  me  to  the  Place  de  la  Roquette, 
and  I  cannot  recall  any  occasion  on  which  anything  in 
the  conduct  of  the  public  called  for  censure.  The  people 
were  some  of  them  excited  ;  others,  like  myself,  were 
profoundly  disgusted  and  ashamed  at  the  whole  grotesque 
and  sanguinary  buffoonery ;  but  what  fault  there  was  to 
be  found  was  rather  with  the  ceremony  itself  than  with 
the  bearing  of  the  spectators. 

The  opponents  of  the  death  penalty  will  take  advan- 
tage of  the  suggestion  of  a  reform  in  the  manner  of 
carrying  out  executions  to  advocate  their  total  abolition  ; 
and  here  Victor  Hugo,  echoing  in  this  respect  Doctor 
Samuel  Johnson,  will  afford  them  some  striking  argu- 
ments, which  to  my  mind  are  irrefutable.  If  the  thing 
is  to  be  done  at  all,  let  it  be  done  with  the  o-reatest 
publicity.  If  you  are  ashamed  of  the  thing,  as  is  every- 
body who  has  attended  an  execution,  then  abolish  it. 
It  is  absurd  to  butcher  a  man  in  a  prison  yard  for  the 


48  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

sake  of  example  ;  and  if  you  deny  that  tlie  death  penalty 
is  inflicted  for  the  sake  of  example  and  warning,  then 
you  surrender  your  last  justification  for  the  brutal 
business.  Let  Society  face  its  responsibility  ;  let  it 
hang  its  murderers  as  high  as  Haman,  so  that  all  the 
world  may  see  what  it  has  done,  or  let  it  resign  into 
wiser  hands  the  powers  of  life  and  death,  if  it  doubt  its 
right  to  wield  them. 

I  have  often  heard  much  amusement  expressed  among 
French  jurists  at  the  idea  which  seems  to  be  held  by 
English  people  about  the  functions  and  powers  of  a 
Court  of  Criminal  Appeal.  The  constant  references 
which  are  made  by  ill-informed  persons  in  London  to 
the  French  Courts  of  Appeal  and  Cassation  invest  these 
tribunals  with  powers  which  they  never  possessed,  and 
which  it  never  entered  the  head  of  any  French  legislator 
to  endow  them  with. 

There  is  only  one  Court  of  Criminal  Appeal  in  France 
which  can  be  addressed  by  a  person  who  is  dissatisfied 
with  his  sentence,  and  that  is  the  Tribunal  des  Appels 
Correctionnels,  a  tribunal  which  is  sufficiently  well  replaced 
in  England  by  the  appeal  to  Quarter  Sessions,  with 
this  advantage  in  France,  that  the  prisoner  has  always 
faculty  of  appealing,  while  in  England  the  very  magis- 
trate or  magistrates  with  whose  decision  fault  is  found 
have  to  grant  permission  for  the  fresh  proceedings  to 
be  taken. 

The  reluctance  frequently  shown  by  country  benches 
to  state  a  case  may  proceed  from  the  fact  that  in  the 
event  of  a  reversal  of  their  decision  the  costs  of  the 
appeal  will  come  out  of  their  own  pockets.  In  France, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  Court  of  Correctional  Appeals 
can  increase  the  original  sentence,  and  has  done  so. 
The   prosecutor,    represented    by  the    Procureur   de   la 


CRIMINAL   APPEAL    IN    FRANCE        49 

Republique,  has,  of  course,  exactly  the  same  right  of 
appeal  as  the  defendant,  and  for  some  years  past  it  has 
been  a  fixed  rule  in  Paris  that  where  a  Police  Cor- 
rectionnelle  prisoner  appeals  against  a  sentence,  the 
Procureur-General  appeals  simultaneously  against  the 
leniency  of  the  sentence  :  a  minima,  as  it  is  called. 

People  in  England  seem  to  forget  that  appeal  must 
necessarily  be  open  to  both  sides  ;  in  other  words,  that 
it  is  a  two-edged  sword.  The  advocates  of  a  Court  of 
Criminal  Appeal  in  England  seem  to  desire  the  institu- 
tion of  a  tribunal  to  which  any  prisoner  who  is  dis- 
satisfied with  his  sentence  may  go  for  a  fresh  trial  and 
a  fresh  consideration  of  the  penalties  he  has  incurred. 
But  these  advocates  do  not  provide  for  the  case  where 
the  higher  court  shall  confirm  the  verdict  and  the 
sentence  of  the  lower  one,  nor  do  they  explain  at  whose 
cost  these  proceedings  are  to  be  taken.  Is  the  Treasury 
or  is  the  prosecutor  to  pay  not  only  the  expenses  of 
the  fresh  prosecution,  but  those  of  a  destitute  prisoner's 
appeal,  or  is  the  Court  of  Criminal  Appeal  in  England 
only  to  be  open  to  moneyed  prisoners,  so  that  the  scandals 
to  which  we  are  familiar  in  the  United  States  may  be 
repeated  at  home  ? 

But  the  great  point  which  these  advocates  overlook 
in  comparing  our  judicial  system  with  that  which  exists 
in  France  is  that  the  French  Court  of  Cassation  does 
not  decide  on  questions  of  fact,  does  not  interfere  with 
la  chose  jttg^e.  It  can  only  be  approached  on  questions 
of  law ;  and  in  this  respect  we  are  as  amply  provided 
in  England  by  means  of  the  Court  of  Crown  Cases 
Reserved.  It  can  direct  a  fresh  trial  on  the  "grounds  of 
some  breach  of  the  strict  regulations  under  which  criminal 
trials  are  ordered ;  where  no  such  breach  has  occurred 
in  the  course  of  the  proceedings,  the  only  resource  that  a 

4 


50  TWENTY   YKARS    IN    PARIS 

prisoner  who  is  tlissatisiicd  with  his  sentence  can  fall 
back  upon  is,  exactly  as  in  Eni^l^land,  his  constitutional 
right  of  appeal  to  the  clemency  of  the  head  of  the  State. 

It  should  be  remembered  that  even  when  a  fresh 
tried  is  ordered  in  France  the  prisoner  is  by  no  means 
assured  that  he  will  fare  better  at  the  hands  of  his  new 
udges,  and  there  can  be  no  reason  to  expect  that  in 
England  under  the  new  order  of  things  a  reduction  of 
sentence  could  always  be  looked  for.  In  France  the 
second  jury  often  takes  a  much  more  severe  view  of 
the  prisoner's  guilt  than  the  first  jury  had  taken. 
Appeal,  it  may  be  repeated,  is  a  two-edged  sword.  I 
do  not  need  any  better  example  of  that  than  the  case  of 
INIadame  Groetzinger,  who  was  tried  for  murder  at  the 
Paris  Court  of  Assizes  two  or  three  years  ago.  The 
murder  was  a  particularly  brutal  one  ;  she  had  shot  her 
husband  in  a  treacherous  manner  as  she  was  handing 
him  his  coffee  one  morning  in  bed,  and  there  were 
other  circumstances  which  deepened  her  guilt.  The 
Paris  jury,  however,  took  a  lenient  view  of  the  case, 
and  returned  such  a  verdict  as  limited  the  sentence 
which  the  court  was  able  to  pass  to  one  of  five  years' 
solitary  confinement. 

Madame  Groetzinger  was  very  dissatisfied  with  this 
sentence  (in  England  she  would  most  certainly  have 
been  capitally  convicted  and  as  certainly  hanged),  and 
appealed  on  some  technical  grounds  to  the  Court  of 
Cassation.  Some  irregularities  had  been  committed 
(amongst  other  things,  one  of  the  jurymen  had  uttered 
an  exclamation  of  horror  on  hearing  some  particularly 
revolting  detail),  and  the  Higher  Court  quashed  the 
verdict  and  sentence,  and  ordered  a  fresh  trial. 

As  usual  in  appeal  cases  from  the  Paris  Assize 
Court,  the  fresh  trial  was  held  at  the  Assize  Court  of 


THE    DANGERS    OF   APPEAL  51 

Versailles.  Here  the  jury  took  a  severe  view  of  Madame 
Groetzinger's  crime,  and  found  her  guilty  of  murder 
without  any  extenuating  circumstances.  In  consequence, 
the  Versailles  judges  had  no  option  but  to  sentence  her 
to  death.  And  it  cannot  be  argued  that  the  Versailles 
jury  is  always  severe  where  Parisian  murderers  come 
before  it,  because  one  remembers  many  cases  where 
sentences  have  been  reduced  at  a  fresh  trial  in  the 
chef-lieu  of  Seine-et-Oise,  as,  for  instance,  the  case  of 
the  Fenayrous. 

It  seems  to  me  that  justice  would  have  been  treated 
with  respect  if  Madame  Groetzinger  had  been  forced  to 
abide  by  the  results  of  her  appeal,  and  I  am  quite  certain 
that  in  England  she  would  so  have  been  forced  to  abide ; 
but  President  Loubet  took  the  view  she  had  been  too 
harshly  dealt  with,  and  commuted  her  sentence  back  to 
the  one  originally  passed  upon  her.  But  this  instance 
shows  that  in  France  appeal  is  by  no  means  always  in 
favour  of  the  panel,  and  this  is  a  fact  which  the  agitators 
for  judicial  reform  in  England  would  do  well  to 
remember. 


CHAPTER    IV 

Alexandre  Dumas  Fils — Below  Stairs  in  the  Avenue  de  Villiers — Jean 
Richepin — "La  Dame  aux  Camdlias" — Flaubert  and  "Madame 
Bovary" — Guy  de  Maupassant — His  Contempt  for  Literature— His 
Adulation  of  "Society"— Pessimism  and  Pessimists — The  Norman 
Peasants — The  Doctor  and  his  Patient — De  Maupassant's  Illness — 
Dr.  Blanche — His  Absent-mindedness— De  Maupassant's  End. 

IT  was,  thanks  to  Lady  D N 's  birthday-book 
that  a  month  or  two  after  I  had  got  it  back  from 
Madame  Lockroy,  embellished  with  Victor  Hugo's  last 
signature,  I  made  the  personal  acquaintance  of  Alexandre 
Dumas  Jils.  I  had,  however,  been  in  frequent  corre- 
spondence with  him  for  some  time  previously  on  literary 
matters.  He  had  been  consultino"  me  on  the  Eno;lish  laws 
on  bastardy  and  the  position  in  England  of  illegitimate 
children,  and — which  explains  the  frequency  of  our 
letters — did  not  seem  able  to  believe  that  in  any  civilised 
country  such  laws  could  exit  as  in  England  regulate  the 
position  of  natural  offspring. 

It  was  at  his  invitation  that  I  called  one  evening 
at  his  house  in  the  Avenue  de  Villiers,  to  fetch  the  book 
which  I  had  sent  him  for  his  signature  with  a  note  some 
days  before.  It  was  the  first  time  that  I  had  been  to  the 
house,  and  by  accident  rang  at  the  porte  de  service,  or 
tradesmen's  entrance.  I  was  duly  ushered  into  the 
kitchen.  The  cook  was  busy  dishing  up  the  novelist's 
dinner,  and  the  footman,  who  may  have  thought  me  a 

52 


BELOW   STAIRS   CHEZ    DUMAS   FILS    53 

competitor  for  his  office,  evidently  considered  me  beneath 
his  notice.  So  I  sat  down  in  the  kitchen  and  watched 
the  proceedings,  and  could  not  help  but  overhear  the  con- 
versation of  the  servants.  This  mainly  turned  on  the 
kindness  of  the  "patron"  and  the  acrimony  of  the 
"  patronne,"  who,  as  I  knew,  was  a  confirmed  invalid. 
It  appeared  that  it  was  Dumas's  custom  to  visit  her 
every  morning,  and  to  spend  two  hours  by  her  bedside, 
cheering  her  up  with  his  brilliant  conversation.  From 
what  the  servants  said,  he  was  not  always  successful 
in  winning  her  into  a  pleasant  humour,  and  I  will  not 
repeat  what  alternative  treatment  was  suggested  in 
the  servants'  hall  for  dealing  with  this  unpopular  lady. 

At  last  such  scabrous  details  were  entered  upon 
that  I  felt  like  an  eavesdropper  in  remaining  there 
any  longer,  and  I  bade  the  footman  take  my  card 
up  to  his  master.  He  refused  to  disturb  the  "  patron" 
while  he  was  at  dinner;  "and,  young  man,"  he 
said,  "  that  is  as  much  in  your  interest  as  in  mine." 
When,  some  time  later,  I  was  ushered  into  Dumas's 
study,  and  he  had  heard  where  I  had  been  waiting, 
he  was  vastly  amused,  and  said,  "  You  ought  to 
find  there  the  subject  for  a  comedy.  You  remember 
where  Sardou  found  his  Pattes  de  Motccke  ?  In  a 
tobacconist's  shop."  I  told  him  that  an  English  comedy 
existed  which  is  called  High  Life  Below  Stairs,  and  I 
added  that  if  I  did  venture  to  think  of  writing  for  the 
theatre,  it  would  be  my  ambition  to  write  a  play  in  which 
Sarah  Bernhardt  could  act  the  leading  part.  "  And," 
said  Dumas,  "you  do  not  see  Sarah  in  the  role  of  a 
cook?"  "  No,"  I  said,  "  nor  Jean  Richepin  as  a  valet 
de  chambre." 

At  that  time  Jean  Richepin  was  in  close  attendance 
on  Madame  Bernhardt.     He  had  abandoned  his  literary 


54  T\Vi:X  rV    Yl'ARS    IN    PARIS 

work,  and  hatl  apjxMred  in  her  company  on  the  stage  of 
t)ni'  of  the  boulevard  theatres  in  the  role  of  Nana  Sahil), 
in  wliich  he  had  been  able  to  ,2^ive  full  play  to  his  hatred 
tor  the  luiglish.  A  day  or  two  previously  a  friend 
had  taken  me  to  see  Sarali  Bernhardt  in  her  looc  at  the 
Vaudeville  Theatre,  and  in  the  little  saloi  adjoining  the 
dressing-room  we  had  met  Richepin.  He  folded  his 
arms  and  treated  us,  I  think  because  w^e  were  English, 
to  his  most  melodramatic  scowl.  I  must  make  haste  to  add, 
however,  that  years  have  wrought  a  great  change  in  him. 
His  character  has  altogether  softened  down,  and  one 
night  at  Daudet's  house,  after  a  long  conversation 
with  the  author  of  Le  Flibiistier,  I  determined  that 
Jean  Richepin  was  one  of  the  most  delightful  and 
sympathetic  men  I  had  ever  met. 

In  the  course  of  my  conversation  with  Dumas y?/f  I 
made  some  reference  to  ''La  Dame  anx  Cam^lias!' 
He  did  not  seem  very  pleased  at  the  mention  of  this 
name,  and  exclaimed  :  "  Toujours  done  la  Dame  aux 
Camelias!"  I  presumed  that  he  meant  that  after-ex- 
perience had  rendered  him  sceptical  of  the  depth  of 
disinterested  affection,  of  which  the  Marguerite  Gauthiers 
of  this  world  are  capable,  and  that  his  attitude  on  the 
subject  of  unchaste  women  might  rather  be  gathered 
from  what  he  had  written  in  the  appendix  to  his  book 
V Affaire  CUmenceati.  His  irritation  at  the  mention 
of  his  famous  novel  I  afterwards  understood  better  when 
Guy  de  Maupassant  had  told  me  that  the  mere  name  of 
Madame  Bovary  used  to  exasperate  Gustave  Flaubert 
into  the  use  of  strong  and  even  foul  language,  which  in 
so  refined  a  purist  might  be  taken  as  a  sign  of  very  great 
anger  indeed.  I  presume  that  it  must  indeed  be  galling 
for  an  author  who  has  written  many  books  to  find  that 
the  public,   disregarding  all  his  later  efforts,  persists  in 


FLAUBERT   AND   MADAME  BOVARY   55 

labelling  him  as  the  author  of  the  book  by  which  his 
reputation  was  first  made.  So  strongly  did  Flaubert  feel 
on  this  subject  that  in  his  later  years  he  used  systematically 
to  decry  what  is  his  undoubted  masterpiece.  "  Madame 
Bovary  c'est  de  la  cochonnerie.  Madame  Bovary  c'est 
de  la "  he  used  to  shout  out  when  anybody  con- 
gratulated him  on  this  book.  "  To  hear  him  talk  of 
'  Madame  Bovary^  "  said  de  Maupassant,  "  one  would 
really  have  thought  that  he  was  ashamed  of  the  book." 
In  poor  de  Maupassant's  case,  by  the  way,  the  process 
was  reversed.  He  is  spoken  of,  and  indeed  before  his 
lamentable  death  was  known  as,  the  author  of  La 
Horla,  which  not  only  was  one  of  his  last  works,  but 
the  work  in  which  the  dirge  of  his  fine  intellect  began 
to  toll. 

I  was  all  the  more  impressed  by  Maupassant's 
remarks  because  it  was  very  rare  indeed  to  hear  the 
young  master  make  any  pronouncements  on  literature. 
"  There  are  so  many  things  of  so  much  greater  interest 
to  talk  about,"  he  used  to  say.  If  de  Maupassant  wrote 
at  all  it  was  with  no  sense  of  a  vocation.  It  was,  I 
suppose,  because  the  man  who  has  the  caco-ethes  must  even 
take  pen  in  hand,  and  it  was  because,  for  a  life  of  pleasure 
and  luxury,  the  large  revenues  produced  by  his  pen  were 
indispensable  accessories  of  income.  He  despised  litera- 
ture as  a  m-Mier,  he  loathed  the  professional  homme  de 
lettres  as  such,  and  avoided  his  literary  confreres  with  as 
much  diligence  as  he  sought  after  those  who  float,  idle 
butterflies,  through  life. 

I  first  made  his  acquaintance  in  188 — ,  shortly  after 
he  had  written  Yvette,  and  was  impressed  with  the  utter 
contempt  with  which  he  spoke  of  the  effort.  At  that 
time  he  seemed  vastly  to  prefer  to  talk  about  the  sea  and 
about  yachting,  and  he  was  rather  proud  of  the  fact  that 


56  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

some  time  previously  he  had  rescued  from  the  waves  at 
Etretat  the  Enj^Hsh  poet  Swinburne,  who,  Byron-like,  a 
magnificent  swimnu-r,  had  on  that  occasion  outswum  his 
strength,  De  Maupassant  asked  me  to  come  down  to 
his  villa  "  Les  Mouettes."  "  You  will  be  able  to  study 
the  Norman  peasants  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Etretat 
better  than  in  my  books,"  he  said.  I  asked  him  for  the 
authorisation  to  translate  Yvette  into  English,  and  he 
said,  "  Traduisez,  traduisez  "  ;  but  he  refused  to  listen  to 
any  business  proposals  on  the  subject. 

It  was  on  a  subsequent  occasion  that  he  spoke  of 
Flaubert  and  Madame  B ovary ;  but  I  fancy  that  he 
was  always  ready  to  admit  his  indebtedness  to  Flaubert, 
and  indeed  anxious  to  proclaim  it.  It  was  under  the 
tutorship  of  his  kinsman  that  he  learned  that  supremacy 
of  style  which  he  maintained  throughout,  and  which  was 
always  his  first  preoccupation.  On  one  of  the  rare 
occasions  on  which  I  ever  heard  him  talk  of  literature  and 
of  his  methods  of  work,  he  spoke  in  confirmation  of 
what  is  told  of  the  author  of  Madame  Bovary,  that  he 
used  to  write  up  sentences  on  a  blackboard,  so  as  well 
to  be  able  to  discern  their  beauties  or  their  defects. 
"  There  was  much  good  in  the  practice,"  he  said,  and 
he  told  me  how  he  polished  and  revised.  For  the  rest, 
he  was  known  to  be  a  rapid  writer,  and  by  fits  and 
starts  of  immense  industry  and  productiveness. 

At  the  age  of  forty-three,  when  his  fine  career  was 
brought  to  so  lamentable  a  close,  he  had  produced  more 
than  twice  the  gigantic  output  of  Balzac,  whom  with 
Zola  he  held  to  be  "the  father  of  us  all,"  and,  even  as 
Balzac  did  at  his  age,  looked  upon  all  that  he  had  done 
till  then  as  a  mere  preface  to  what  was  to  follow.  I  had 
not  met  him  for  over  a  year  when  the  blow  fell,  and  on 
the  last  occasion  on  which  I  saw  him,  at  a  garden-party 


GUY  DE  MAUPASSANT 


THE  PROPHECIES  OF  PROFESSOR  BALL  57 

in  Sevres,  it  had  struck  me  that  there  was  something 
strange  in  his  conversation.  He  kept  talking  of  money 
and  of  fashionable  folk  whom  he  had  met  or  whom  he 
had  hoped  to  meet,  as  though  by  birth  and  talents  he  was 
not  very  far  superior,  even  from  a  social  point  of  view,  to 
all  the  silly  people  whose  names  he  mentioned. 

I  suppose  that  if  I  had  been  a  pathologist  I  should 
then  and  there  have  recognised  in  this  talk  the 
prodromes  of  megalomania  and  general  paralysis.  I 
presume  that  Maupassant  was  one  of  the  men  referred 
to  by  Professor  Ball,  when  lecturing  at  the  Ecole  de 
France  on  that  form  of  insanity,  as  marked  out  as  one 
of  its  victims.  The  Professor  said :  "  There  are  at 
present  living  in  Paris,  and  astonishing  the  world 
with  the  brilliancy  of  their  intellects  and  the  wonderful 
cleverness  of  their  writings  and  conversation,  several 
men  whose  very  cleverness  and  brilliancy  are  recognised 
by  the  pathologists  as  certain  signs  of  the  approach 
of  general  paralysis."  The  prophecy  came  true  in  the 
case  of  de  Maupassant  and  of  others  ;  but  the  terrible 
irony  of  Fate  which  so  appealed  to  the  Greek  tragedians 
manifested  itself  here  also,  and  Professor  Ball  himself 
was  the  first  to  fall  a  victim  to  the  insanity  which  he  had 
analysed  so  well  in  his  writings  and  in  his  lectures. 

If  in  those  early  days  I  had  been  asked  to  predict, 
having  been  assured  that  there  were  the  germs  of 
insanity  in  de  Maupassant,  to  what  form  of  the  malady  he 
would  succumb,  I  should  have  answered  that  probably 
melancholia  would  eventually  seize  upon  this  man,  who 
in  his  writings  showed  himself  so  confirmed  a  pessimist. 
At  that  time  I  had  not  acquainted  myself  with  the 
biography  of  Schopenhauer  ;  I  had  not  studied  certain 
contemporaries  in  their  daily  life  ;  and  Hartmann  had 
not   yet  afforded    a   striking  example.     I   still  believed 


5S  TWENTY    VICARS    IN    PARIS 

pessimism  to  be  altruistic,  whereas  the  fiict  is  that 
it  is  one  of  the  most  pronounced  expressions  of  the 
most  egotistical  individualism.  In  the  pessimism  of  a 
Maupassant,  a  Schopenhauer,  or  an  Ibsen  sorrow  for 
the  human  weaknesses  which  they  so  pitilessly  expose, 
compassion  for  the  victims  of  these  impulses  and 
passions  are  entirely  wanting.  I  believe  that  most 
pessimists  despise  humanity  in  the  inverse  ratio  to  their 
admiration  for  themselves,  an  admiration  which  in  the 
end  develops  in  many  cases  into  megalomania  and  that 
form  of  insanity  of  which  it  is  the  harbinger, 

De  Maupassant's  pessimism,  however,  proceeded  not 
entirely  from  this  disdain  of  humanity.  The  despair 
of  life  was  the  text  from  which  he  constantly  preached, 
and  it  seemed  to  me,  when  the  blow  fell,  a  strange 
fact  and  a  striking  one  that  the  pessimism  and  the 
despair  of  life  which  he  had  taught  ever  since  he  took 
pen  in  hand  should  have  received  confirmation  in  a 
manner  so  inexpressibly  sad.  What  indeed,  one  might 
ask,  is  the  good  of  ambition,  and  of  hope,  and  of  effort, 
and  of  project,  and  all  of  the  other  impulses  to  which 
the  human  marionette  moves,  when  the  end  was  there, 
— there,  in  that  discreet  house  in  Passy,  Doctor 
Blanche's  asylum,  to  which  so  many  waifs  and  strays 
have  come?  "A  quoi  bon?''  was  the  text  from  which 
he  preached  again  and  again,  and  ''A  quoi  bon?''  in- 
deed, might  one  ask  when  one  thought  of  his  genius 
distracted,  of  the  bells,  once  so  precise  and  clear,  all 
jangled  out  of  tune,  of  the  hand  relinquishing  the  master- 
pen    to  grope  stealthily  for  an  arm  for  self-destruction. 

From  his  writings,  Guy  de  Maupassant  appeared 
as  a  pessimist  to  the  innermost  fibre  of  his  being.  He 
appeared  as  a  pessimist  from  reason  and  by  observa- 
tion.    From  reason,  for  he  argued,  as  in  his  V Inutile 


THE  PESSIMISM  OF  DE  MAUPASSANT  59 

Beauts,  that  man,  having  no  place  in  this  world,  must 
necessarily  be  unhappy,  where  provision  for  animal 
happiness  has  alone  been  made,  and  by  observation, 
from  his  supreme  contempt  of  human  nature.  Despising 
men  and  women,  in  rebellion  against  the  circumstance 
that,  a  man  himself,  he  had  to  live  out  a  man's  life, 
seeing  no  port  to  which  it  was  worth  his  while  to 
steer,  he  seemed,  from  his  writings,  to  have  abandoned 
the  helm  and  to  be  allowing  himself  to  drift  rudderless 
into  stormy  seas. 

The  psychological  truth,  in  fact,  was  different ;  I 
am  speaking  from  what  appeared  from  his  writings. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  he  seemed  to  enjoy  life  very  much, 
and  for  Society  he  had  none  of  that  contempt  which 
he  expressed  for  humanity  in  general.  One  knows, 
similarly,  that  Schopenhauer  exulted  in  the  sensualities 
of  the  table,  and  as  a  boon-companion  was  the  most 
exuberant  of  men.  I  have  seen  Maupassant  radiantly 
happy.  His  summers  were  usually  spent  at  Etretat, 
and  it  was  there  that  I  once  met  him  cycling  in  a  lane 
which  was  redolent  with  hawthorn  blossoms.  I  do 
not  think  that   I   ever  saw  a  man  who  looked  happier. 

In  his  writings,  again,  he  always  showed  himself  happy 
when  he  got  away  from  Man,  and  faced  Nature. 
Where,  for  instance,  could  one  find  more  exuberance 
of  spirits,  more  Lebensfreude,  more  enthusiasm,  and 
more  colour  than  in  his  book  Sur  r Eaii,  which  gives 
a  series  of  pictures  sketched  while  yachting  on  summer 
seas.  Every  prospect  seemed  to  please  him  :  man  he 
always  found  vile.  If  one  met  him  in  Paris,  unless 
the  society  which  surrounded  him  was  of  the  very 
highest  aristocracy,  he  showed  himself  irritable,  reserved, 
capricious,  and  on  his  guard.  He  had  all  the  restlessness 
that  is  one  of  the  prodromes  of  the  malady  to  which  he 


6o  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

succumbed  ;  he  could  not  settle  down  anywhere  in 
town,  and  dra2:£red  his  cnmti  from  one  house  to  another. 
I  have  heard  it  said  of  him,  "  Qu'il  ddmdnage  pour  le  plaisir 
de  demenager."  He  was  not  popular  in  the  society 
which  he  so  adulated,  in  spite  of  his  recognised  mastery. 

One  can  quite  understand  that  he  has  never  acquired 
fame  in  England,  where  the  great  artistic  truth  that  the 
fable  is  no  less  true  because  the  wolf  is  cruel,  the  fox 
cunning,  and  the  monkey  malignant,  is  not  recognised, 
and  where  a  book  is  certain  to  fail  in  popularity  if  the 
characters  are  not  "  sympathetic."  De  Maupassant, 
now,  just  excelled  in  portraits  of  characters  which  are 
not  sympathetic.  His  fables  are  terribly  true  ;  and  because 
this  is  so,  his  men-wolves,  men-foxes,  and  monkey  men 
are  terribly  cruel  and  malignant  and  cunning.  The 
book  which  first  made  his  name,  Boule  de  Suif,  is 
an    album    of   pictures    of   selfishness    and    hypocrisy. 

Selfishness  and  hypocrisy  are  the  texts  of  nine  out 
of  ten  of  his  numerous  short  stories.  In  Une  Vie, 
which  many  consider  his  masterpiece,  the  ugliness  and 
cruelty  of  life,  as  caused  by  man's  selfishness,  are 
mercilessly  exposed.  Bel-Ami  shows  how,  by  an 
unchecked  exercise  of  these  vices,  a  man  may  rise,  as 
Society  is  at  present  constituted  in  France,  from  the 
lowest  to  the  most  high  degree.  Bel-Ami,  it  may 
be  added,  was  not  a  creation,  but  a  portrait  from  life. 
The  original  of  George  Duroy  still  looms  large  in 
Tout-Paris.  Only  a  few  days  ago  I  saw  him  pass 
down  the  Champs-Elysees  in  a  superb  carriage.  He 
decries   motoring  as  the  sport  of  the  vulgar. 

If  the  truth  were  known,  I  believe  that  in  his 
pictures  of  Norman  peasants  de  Maupassant,  who  was 
a  Norman  himself  and  was  passionately  attached  to  a 
province,    with    the    oldest   families    of  which    he    was 


NORMAN    CHARACTERISTICS  6i 

connected  by  blood,  did  not  at  all  posture  as  a  censor. 
I  think  that  the  cunning  and  greed,  the  piratical  rapacity 
of  his  types  appealed  now  to  his  sense  of  humour, 
now  to  his  admiration  for  the  qualities  which  made 
of  the  Normans  the  masters  of  the  world.  He  very 
cynically  admitted  towards  the  end  his  own  love  of 
gain.  In  his  madness  his  ravings  were  entirely  about 
money. 

His  portrayals  of  Norman  peasants  will  not  strike 
as  overdrawn  anyone  who  has  lived  in  that  province. 
Only  the  other  day  a  doctor  in  the  small  country  town 
in  Normandy  where  I  pass  my  summers  told  me  an 
anecdote  about  one  of  his  clients,  a  Norman  peasant, 
which  made  me  exclaim,  "  Oh !  that  de  Maupassant 
could  hear  that !  " 

This  doctor,  several  years  ago,  performed  upon  a 
man  who  had  been  abandoned  by  the  first  physicians  in 
Paris  an  operation  of  the  most  delicate  nature.  At  the 
time,  when  he  first  saw  the  man,  the  physicians  told  him 
that  an  operation  must  kill  him  ;  that  it  was  best  to 
leave  him  to  his  fate  ;  and  that  he  had  expressed  the 
intention,  to  escape  his  horrible  sufferings,  to  put  an  end 
to  his  existence. 

"  I  replied,"  said  the  doctor,  "  that  if  the  man  had 
to  die,  it  would  be  better  that  he  should  die  under  our 
hands  than  by  self-destruction,  and  I  duly  performed 
the  operation.  My  colleagues  seemed  to  think  it  very 
presumptuous  of  a  young,  inexperienced  practitioner,  as 
I  then  was,  to  dictate  to  them  ;  but  as  they  had  given 
the  patient  up,  I  felt  justified  in  acting.  The  operation 
was  entirely  successful,  and  the  man  recovered. 

"  Well,  some  days  ago  he  called  on  me,  and  told  me 
that  now  he  was  getting  too  old  to  work  he  had  come 
to  see  what  I  was  going  to  do  for  him.     I  asked  him 


62  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

what  lie  meant,  and  he  said  :  '  Tliat  operation  which  you 
performed  on  me  fifteen  years  ago  must  have  done  you 
a  lot  of  good  in  your  profession.  I  know  that  it  was 
much  talked  about,  and  that  accounts  of  it  appeared  in 
the  Paris  papers.  Now,  it  seems  to  me,  that  as  I  helped 
you  along  in  your  profession,  and  as  you  are  doing  so 
well,  you  ought  to  remember  who  gave  you  your  first 
start,  and  provide  for  me,  now  that  I  can't  earn  my  own 
living.  I  really  think  you  ought  to  settle  an  annuity 
on  me.' 

"  The  man  was  quite  in  earnest,"  the  doctor  added  ; 
'•  and  he  came  several  times  to  try  to  convince  me  of 
the  justice  of  his  claim." 

In  his  later  works,  such  as  Notre  Ccetcr  and  Fori 
Comyne  La  Mort,  not  to  mention  others,  which  seem 
to  have  been  written  entirely  for  commercial  purposes, 
de  Maupassant,  it  is  true,  laid  the  lash  aside.  It  is 
true,  also,  that  success  did  not  follow  him  in  his  new 
departure.  Critics  used  to  express  their  wonder  that, 
knowing  his  attitude  towards  life  and  mankind,  he  should 
ever  have  essayed  to  explain  a  happiness  which  he  had 
always  denied.  "  It  is  one  thing,"  they  said,  "  to  analyse 
vice,  and  another  to  show  the  psychology  of  love.  Love 
is  of  so  rare  and  delicate  an  essence  that  it  cannot  be 
touched  with  the  scalpel." 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  those  who  knew  the  intimacies 
of  Guy  de  Maupassant's  life,  knew  of  a  love  story  in 
which  he  had  shown  himself  the  most  impassioned  of 
wooers,  and  of  lovers  the  most  ardent  and  faithful.  It 
was  my  privilege  to  have  in  my  hands  a  collection  of 
love-letters  written  by  him,  and  I  sometimes  regret  that 
I  did  not  consent  to  make  use  of  them  for  publication. 
They  would  have  taken  their  place  amongst  the  finest 
letters  which  have  been  given  to  the  world.     They  were 


DE    MAUPASSANT'S    LOVE-LETTERS     63 

models  of  the  style,  and  I  do  not  think  that  de  Mau- 
passant ever  surpassed  in  any  of  his  works  the  beauty 
of  this  prose. ^ 

These  letters  were  offered  to  me  at  a  time  when  I 
was  thinking  of  writing  a  biography  of  de  Maupassant, 
in  which  I  was  to  have  had  the  advantage  of  Monsieur 
Hugues  Rebell's  collaboration.  I  decided,  however, 
that  it  would  be  difficult  to  find  any  public  in  England 
for  a  book  about  a  French  novelist  who  was  first  intro- 
duced into  England  through  the  agency  of  the  Holywell 
Street  booksellers.  As  to  the  love-letters,  undoubtedly 
they  would  have  added  many  splendid  pages  to  my 
book  ;  but  I  had  not  forgotten  what  many  of  us  thought, 
and  what  one  expressed  in  undying  verse,  when  Keats's 
love-letters  were  brought  to  the  hammer.  These  letters 
of  de  Maupassant,  it  may  be  hoped,  will  remain  amongst 
the  unknown  writings  of  their  author,  as  high  in  a  degree 
of  excellence  as  the  work  which  he  used  to  publish,  for 
sheer  love  of  gain,  under  the  name  of  Mattfrigneuse,  was 
low  and  unworthy. 

I  remember  that  on  one  of  the  first  occasions  on  which 
I  met  him,  I  showed  him  a  London  Society  paper  which 
contained,  signed  by  a  well-known  lady  novelist,  as  an 
original  story  from  her  pen,  an  adaptation  of  one  of  his 
contes,  which  followed  the  original  so  closely  as  to  be  a 
mere  translation.  I  told  him  what  was  the  fact,  that 
his  work  was  being  shamelessly  pillaged  by  the  pirates. 
He  shrugged  his  shoulders,  and  referring  to  the  lady  in 
question,  said,  "  Est-elle  au  moins  jolie?"  He  added, 
"  lis  le  sont  rarement,  les  bas-bleus."  Towards  the  end, 
however,  he  developed  very  keen  business  qualities, 
and  one  of  his  last  acts,  before  his  fateful  visit  to  the 

^  Guy  de  Maupassant's  correspondence  with  Marie  Bashkirtsheff, 
who  had  addressed  him  anonymously,  should  be  remembered. 


64  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

South  of  France,  was  to  expose  an  act  of  piracy  by  which 
he  had  been  victimised. 

As  I  had  the  advantage  of  knowing  Doctor  Blanche, 
the  celebrated  physician  who  kept  the  private  inaison 
de  saitti^  where  de  Maupassant  was  treated  after  they 
brought  him  back  from  the  South,  I  was  able  to  keep 
myself  informed  of  the  progress  of  his  malady.  Alas  ! 
at  no  time  was  the  news  reassuring.  I  used  to  meet 
Doctor  Blanche  on  the  boulevards — one  of  the  very 
few  distinguished  Parisians  I  have  ever  met  on  the 
boulevards — and  we  stopped  and  spoke  of  the  illustrious 
patient. 

I  was  never  very  easy  during  these  interviews, 
because  Doctor  Blanche,  like  many  men  whose  minds 
are  much  occupied,  had  the  habit,  after  taking  one's 
hand  in  salute,  of  forgetting  to  carry  out  the  motion 
of  greeting.  He  gripped  one's  hand,  more  firmly  than 
otherwise,  and  kept  hold  of  it.  This  was  also  the 
custom  of  the  late  James  Blaine,  the  ex-Secretary,  who 
on  one  occasion  kept  me  for  fully  sixty  seconds  with 
my  hand  locked  in  his,  as  though  we  were  posturing 
before  a  camera.  In  Blaine's  case  this  gave  no  cause 
for  special  anxiety,  but  I  confess  that  when  Doctor 
Blanche,  the  mad-doctor,  held  me  thus  in  custody,  his 
eyes  fixed  upon  my  face,  a  feeling  of  some  uneasiness 
used  to  steal  over  me.  I  wanted  to  listen  to  what  he 
was  saying  to  me,  but  I  also  wanted  him  to  release 
my  hand.  The  absurd  idea  beset  me  that  he  would 
suddenly  tighten  his  grip,  and,  dragging  me  into  his 
brougham,  transport  me  to  Passy,  the  petite  maison  and 
the  padded  cell.  I  am  quite  certain  that  even  the 
strongest-minded  man  might  feel  some  qualms  in  the 
presence  of  so  reputed  a  pathologist  under  such 
circumstances. 


MAUPASSANT'S    LAST   DAYS  65 

Poor  de  Maupassant's  madness  ran  its  usual  course. 
He  imagined  himself  the  possessor  of  boundless  wealth. 
His  talk  was  all  of  millions  and  billions  and  trillions. 
He  wanted  to  dig  holes  in  which  to  bury  his  immense 
accumulations  of  gold.  He  shouted  into  an  imaginary- 
telephone  orders  to  his  stockbroker  to  buy  the  French 
Rentes  en  bloc.  At  times,  flying  into  mad  passions, 
he  would  dash  round  and  round  the  room  in  pursuit 
of  some  phantom  thief  The  only  mercy  that  was 
shown  to  him  was  that  he  died  in  one  of  these  terrible 
paroxysms.  He  died  while  he  still  had  the  semblance 
and  the  bearing  of  a  man.  His  friends  were  spared 
the  spectacle  of  that  awful  degradation  into  a  condition 
lower  than  anything  in  animal  life,  to  which  general 
paralysis  where  it  runs  its  whole  sacrilegious  course, 
brings  its  victims.  There  was  no  very  great  change 
in  his  appearance  when  he  died.  Somebody  who  saw 
him  after  his  death  said  to  me,  "He  looks  like  a  soldier 
who  has  died  on  the  field  of  battle." 

He  certainly  bore  some  resemblance  to  the  popular 
military  type,  with  his  hair  cropped  a  la  Bressan,  his 
thick  moustache,  and  the  scrupulous  neatness  of  his 
attire.  He  was  always  anxious  to  disassociate  him- 
self by  his  personal  appearance  and  dress  from  the 
extravagances  and  Bohemianism  of  the  professional 
homme  de  lettres.  And  though  he  would  not  have  liked 
the  comparison,  I  think  that  it  may  be  said  that,  as 
when  he  was  struck  down,  he  was  in  full  literary 
activity,  Guy  de  Maupassant  died  ait  champ  d'honneur 


CHAPTER   V 

Dumas  yf/j  and  Dumas  pere — Dumas  yf/j  and  Jules  Verne — His  Curiosity 
about  Modem  Paris — The  Little  Old  Woman  on  Two  Sticks — 
Margfuerite  Lienard  at  Home — A  Midnight  Conversation — The  Ob- 
servations of  a  Professional  Beggar — Her  Long  Career — The  Two 
Communards,  Father  and  Son — Those  that  Disappear— The  Dead 
who  walk  again. 

IT  vvas  difficult  for  me  to  realize,  as  I  sat  talking  that 
evening  with  the  polished  and  urbane  Alexandre 
Dumas,  that  this  was  the  son  of  that  Alexandre  Dumas 
of  whom  Hippolyte  Taine,  in  the  conversation  to  which 
I  have  already  alluded,  spoke  to  me  in  the  following 
terms  :  "  Dumas /t-r^?  Ah,  poor  Dumas!  An  immense 
genius,  but  not  possible  as  a  member  of  the  French 
Academy.  It  would  not  have  been  his  place,  nor 
would  he  have  been  at  ease  there.  Dumas  had  much 
of  the  negro  in  his  exuberant  temperament — a  Bacchus, 
a  Silenus,  a  volcano,  a  fountain,  a  jet  contimi,  making 
fortunes  and  devouring  them,  producing  books  by  the 
hundred,  taking  here  and  giving  there,  at  rest  never, 
a  spirit  of  unrest  if  there  ever  was  one.  He  was  a  man," 
concluded  Taine,  speaking  very  pompously,  **  whom  it 
was  most  difficult  to  admit  to  an  institution  where  a 
certain  equanimity  of  temperament  is  an  indispensable 
qualification." 

That  conversation  had  not  taken  place  at  the  time 
of  my  first  visit  to  the  house  in  the  Avenue  de  Villiers  ; 

66 


Photo  by  Pierre  Petit  &fds,  Paris. 

ALEXANDRE   DUMAS   fils. 


ALEXANDRE    DUMAS  FILS  67 

but  Taine's  description  of  the  elder  Dumas  only  repeated 
what  I  had  heard  of  him  on  every  side.  Dumas  filsy 
I  should  say,  must  have  appealed  to  Taine  and  his 
brother  academicians  as  the  very  type  of  the  writer  who, 
in  their  jargon,  is  acaddmisable .  He  was  a  man  of  most 
distinguished  manners,  agreeable  in  voice,  apparently 
modest,  certainly  courteous,  soberly  elegant  in  his  dress. 
In  him  the  man  of  letters  disappeared  behind  the  man  of 
the  world.  He  had  that  winning  and  studied  manner 
which  used  to  distinguish  the  diplomatists  of  the  tradition 
of  Talleyrand  or  Metternich.  Nothing  either  in  his 
appearance  or  his  temperament  betrayed  the  infusion 
of  neQ;ro  blood.  He  was  more  Parisian  than  the 
Parisians.  I  found  him  a  kind  and  obliging  man 
during  the  eleven  years  that  our  acquaintance  lasted. 
He  frequently  rendered  me  small  services,  and  very 
shortly  before  his  death,  although  at  that  time  he 
was  already  ailing,  he  wrote  me  a  long  letter — it  was 
over  eight  pages  in  length — to  give  me  some  informa- 
tion for  which  I  had  asked. 

He  had  none  of  de  Maupassant's  reluctance  to  "  talk 
literature,"  and  that  evening  he  rather  closely  questioned 
me  on  what  French  books  I  had  read.  He  was 
unaffectedly  pleased  when  I  told  him  what  a  venera- 
tion we  have  in  England  for  his  father's  books,  and 
he  said  more  than  once,  "  Ce  bon  pere !  Ce  grand 
Dumas ! " 

I  must  have  omitted  to  speak  of  Jules  Verne,  for 
at  one  time  he  said  that  he  was  surprised  I  had  not 
read  these  "marvels."  I  at  once  told  him  of  the  immense 
popularity  that  Jules  Verne  enjoys  in  England,  and 
indeed  surprised  him  with  my  account  of  the  enthusiasm 
of  the  Anglo-Saxon  boy  for  this  author's  stories.  He 
said,    "I    wonder  if  Jules  knows  that?     You   ouo:ht  to 


68  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

go  to  Amiens  and  ttll  him.  lie  is  a  modest,  diffident 
man."  Then  he  added,  "  I  am  trying  to  get  the 
Academy  to  recognise  his  merits.  I  am  pushing  his 
claims  to  be  admitted.  But  why  will  he  live  au  bout 
du  mondc  ?  Why  does  he  live  in  Amiens  ?  *  Les 
absents  ont  toujours  tort,'  and  the  fault  that  they  find 
with  hini  is  that  his  style  is  bad,  that  he  has  no  style, 
as  if  that  were  not  a  contradiction  in  itself.  To  have 
no  style  is  to  have  a  good  style.  Dumas  had  no  style. 
I  have  no  style.  Style  is  a  necessity  only  to  the  writer 
who  has  nothing  to  say." 

He  showed   me  where  he  had  written  his  name   in 

Lady  D N 's  birthday-book,  and,  turning  over 

the  pages  of  the  little  volume,  read  out  some  of  the 
aristocratic  and  royal  names  which  were  inscribed  there- 
on. *'  You  had  better  not  ask  Jules  to  write  his  name 
here,"  he  said,  "  for  he  is  a  modest,  retiring  man.  But 
if  you  are  collecting  autographs  in  Paris  you  should 
take  it,  a  few  doors  off,  to  Arsene  Houssaye.  He 
would  be  delighted,"  he  added,  with  the  only  faint 
indication  of  a  sneer  which  I  ever  saw  on  his  lips, 
"to  figure  amongst  company  so  illustrious." 

He  then  asked  me  what  I  was  doing  in  Paris,  and 
when  I  told  him  that  for  the  time  being  I  was  seeing 
everything  that  the  wonderful  city  could  show  me,  he 
exclaimed,  "  How  happy  you  foreigners  are!  You  have 
time  to  see  Paris,  to  study  Paris.  One  must  be  an 
Englishman  or  an  American  to  ascend  the  Vendome 
column  or  to  read  the  inscriptions  in  Notre  Dame. 
We  Parisians  know  nothing  of  Paris  !  Of  many  of  our 
monuments  we  know  no  more  than  that  they  exist. 
And  more  than  the  monuments,  the  types  of  Paris,  the 
hundred  marvellous  types  of  Paris!  How  few  of  us 
trouble  to  study  them  !     There  is  Zola,  who  is  building 


THE    BEGGARS   OF   MODERN    PARIS     69 

up  a  fortune  and  a  fine  reputation  by  doing  what  we 
have  all  neglected  to  do,  studying  the  types  of  Paris, 
like  De  Nittis,  whose  atelier  is  close  to  my  house, 
who  is  teaching  us  the  beauties  of  Paris  as  landscapes. 
These  men  are  undoubtedly  in  the  right." 

He  went  on  to  say  that  the  beggars  of  modern 
Paris,  the  "  Cour  des  Miracles  "  of  the  day,  would  form 
a  most  interesting  study,  and  he  added,  "  For  instance, 
that  old  lady  who  for  as  long  past  as  I  can  remember 
has  sat  at  the  corner  of  the  Boulevard  des  Capucines, 
just  where  one  turns  off  to  go  to  the  Rue  de  la  Paix. 
You  must  have  seen  her.  She  has  two  wooden  legs, 
which  she  stretches  out  on  the  pavement  before  her. 
She  does  not  beg,  but  pretends  to  sell  key-rings.  I  have 
often  wished  to  stop  and  ask  her  to  tell  me  her  story. 
It  should  be  most  interesting.  What  things  that  woman 
must  have  seen !  What  stories  she  could  tell  of  Paris  ! 
She  has  been  sitting  there  for  years.  But  possibly  she 
is  no  observer.  She  may  all  the  time  be  calculating  her 
gains  and  considering  what  investments  she  will  make. 
So  few  people  are  good  observers.  We  notice  that  in 
modern  literature." 

"  One  could  hardly  expect  blue  stockings  on  the  lady 
in  question,"  I  ventured.  "  She  would  hardly  have  any 
use  for  them.     Her  wooden  legs  are  her  raison  d'etre y 

He  laughed,  and  then  he  said,  "  That  is  the  kind  of 
thing  you  ought  to  study  in  Paris.  You  should  go  after 
the  document  humain,  as  they  call  it  now.  Tell  me,  will 
you  go  and  find  out  all  about  this  old  lady,  so  that  when 
we  next  meet  you  can  give  me  her  story  ?  I  was  not 
joking  when  I  said  that  I  have  been  greatly  interested 
in  her,  and  have  often  wanted  to  talk  to  her.  I  have  an 
idea — it  might  be  useful." 

I  do  not  know  what  it  was  that  prevented  me  from 


70  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

carrying  out  the  suggestion  of  Duuvas /i/s,  but  it  was  not 
until  six  years  later  that  I  made  the  acquaintance  of  the 
"  little  old  woman  on  two  slicks  "  in  her  own  home.  She 
did  not  encourage  conversation  with  me  on  the  boulevard. 
It  might  cause  a  crowd  to  gather,  she  used  to  say,  when 
I  tried  to  get  her  to  talk  at  her  place  of  business,  which 
was  with  her  back  to  the  corner  of  the  fine  confectionery 
shop  at  the  corner  of  the  Boulevard  des  Capucines.  I 
met  the  old  lady  near  her  home  one  night  in  May  of 
1890  under  curious  circumstances. 

It  was  a  wet  night,  and  the  hour  was  midnight.  I 
had  happened  to  go  out  to  Batignolles,  and  was  walking 
down  the  sombre  alley  known  as  the  Passage  Cardinet. 
The  silence  was  oppressive  ;  but  when  I  had  got  about 
half-way  down  the  passage  a  curious  noise  began  to 
make  itself  heard — Tack  !  tack  !  tack  ! — like  the  regular 
fall  of  an  iron  hammer  on  the  pavement.  What  could 
it  be  ?  On  it  came.  Tack  !  tack  !  tack  !  Then  in  the 
vague  light  of  a  distant  lamp  a  curious  silhouette 
became  visible  against  the  dark  background  ;  curious, 
because  as  far  as  the  knees  it  was  the  figure  of  a 
woman,  but  from  the  knees  to  the  ground  it  was  only 
space,  broken  by  two  thin  lines.  One  might  have  said 
that  it  was  the  figure  of  a  woman  with  the  fleshless 
tibia  of  a  skeleton.  At  times  these  two  dark  lines 
became  invisible,  and  then  the  woman  seemed  to  sway 
along  in  the  air  at  a  distance  of  about  two  feet  from 
the  ground.  The  tack !  tack !  tack  !  became  louder 
and  louder.  When  the  figure  had  come  within  twenty 
yards,  I  could  see  that  it  was  the  form  of  an  old  woman, 
on  wooden  legs,  labouring  along,  a  stick  in  one  hand  and 
an  umbrella  in  the  other.  A  minute  later  I  had  recog- 
nised her.  It  was  the  woman  who  had  so  interested 
Alexandre  Dumas  the  Younger — that  strange,    sphinx- 


A    MIDNIGHT    ENCOUNTER  71 

like  old  woman  who,  year  in,  year  out,  sat  at  the  corner 
of  the  Opera  Square  in  Paris,  an  object  of  curiosity,  if 
not  of  compassion,  to  every  passer-by. 

"Ah!  bon  soirf  I  said,  as  she  came  up.  "You 
almost  frightened  me.  Your  footfalls  sound  strange  in 
this  deserted  street.  What  on  earth  brings  you  out  into 
this  part  of  Paris  at  this  hour  of  the  night  ?  " 

"  This  part  of  Paris  ?  "  she  cried.  "  You  mustn't  speak 
disrespectfully  of  the  Plaine  des  Batignolles.  Don't  you 
know  that  we  are  within  a  stone's  throw  of  the  Avenue 
de  Villiers,  where  all  the  great  artists  live?" 

It  was  quite  true.  I  had  forgotten  the  fact.  As  we 
were  standing  there  we  were  within  about  ten  minutes' 
walk  of  Dumas's  house. 

"  I  live  here,"  said  the  old  woman,  "  and  have  lived 
here,  in  the  Passage  Cardinet,  for  five  years.  And  I 
shall  live  here  many  years  more  unless  my  landlord  turns 
me  out,  as  he  is  threatening  to  do." 

"Why  so?" 

"  My  rent  is  270  francs,  so  I  ought  to  have  given  him 
67  francs  50  centimes.  Instead  of  this  I  only  gave  him 
10  francs,  and  he  was  indignant,  and  said  that  unless  I 
paid  him  before  the  end  of  the  month,  he  would  put  me 
into  the  street,  wooden  legs  or  no  wooden  legs.  Ah, 
sir,  why  are  we  not  living  under  the  good  King  Louis 
Philippe,  when  for  the  same  money  that  I  am  paying 
now  for  two  miserable  rooms  I  could  have  had  a  kitchen, 
a  dining-room,  two  bedrooms,  a  cellar,  and  a  grenier  ? 
That  was  the  happy  time  in  France  for  people  of  small 
means." 

"But,"  I  said,  "this  is  nonsense.  You  are  very 
rich.  You  are  a  well-known  person  in  Paris.  You  sit 
at  the  world's  centre,  and  every  passer-by  pays  tribute 
to  you," 


/  - 


TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 


She  stamped  one  nC  her  wooden  feet  indignantly  on 
the  pavement. 

"  It's  lies!"  she  cried.  "  It's  all  lies.  It's  lies  like 
these  that  have  ruined  me.  Everybody  thinks  that  I 
am  very  rich,  and  nobody  gives  me  anything  just  for  that 
reason.  They  started  a  lie  years  ago  about  my  owning 
house  property."  Then  interrupting  herself,  she  added  : 
"  But  it's  no  use  our  standing  here.  I  run  the  risk  of 
catching  cold  by  getting  my  feet  damp.  Walk  towards 
my  house  with  me." 

As  we  walked  along  I  could  not  help  wondering  at 
the  great  dexterity  with  which  the  crippled,  old  woman 
strode  along. 

''  You  walk  as  easily  as  I  do." 

She  laughed. 

"  It  would  be  curious,"  she  said,  "  if,  after  sixty-seven 
years'  exercise  on  these  stilts  of  mine,  I  couldn't  walk. 
I  was  born  with  my  legs  paralysed.  I  have  my  legs,  my 
calves,  and  my  feet  just  the  same  as  you  have,  but  they 
are  bent  up  at  the  knee.     I  kneel  on  my  wooden  legs. 

"  But  here  we  are  at  my  house,"  she  said,  pulling  at 
the  bell  of  a  house  before  which  she  had  halted. 

I  pressed  a  gold  coin  into  her  hand,  and  I  said,  "  You 
must  let  me  come  in  and  tell  me  your  story.  It  interests 
me  greatly." 

"  Oh,  I  have  no  objection  to  your  coming  in,"  she 
said.  "  I  have  watched  you  on  the  boulevards  long 
enough,  and  I  take  you  for  a  serious  young  man.  But 
I  have  little  to  tell  you  and  less  to  show. 

"  I  live  on  the  ground-floor,"  she  said,  after  we  had 
entered  the  house,  "on  account  of  my  legs.  It  is  not 
the  Rothschilds'  hotel,  r/iez  mo?'." 

It  certainly  was  not,  but  the  room  into  which  she 
ushered   me  was   very   clean  and   tidy.      In   one  corner 


THE  LITTLE  OLD  WOMAN  ON  STICKS   73 

stood  a  comfortable  bed  ;  a  bright  oilcloth  was  on  the 
table  in  the  centre  of  the  room. 

"  This  is  my  house  property  in  Paris,"  she  said  with  a 
laugh,  waving  her  stick  round  the  room.  "  These  are  my 
landed  estates.  It  is  not  Peru,  as  you  can  see,  but  it 
is  clean  and  tidy.  If  you  ask  me  what  I  am  proudest  of 
in  the  world,  it  is  that."  And  she  pointed  to  the  wall 
behind  her  bed. 

I  looked,  and  saw,  side  by  side,  no  less  than  nineteen 
photographs,  each  in  its  little  frame.  There  were  three 
rows  of  them. 

"  My  husband  and  my  children,"  she  said.  "  I  had 
eighteen  children. 

"  You  have  lost  them  ?  " 

"  They  are  all  dead  but  three,"  she  said — "  two  sons 
and  a  daughter.  My  younger  son  lives  with  me  ;  my 
daughter  is  married.     The  elder  son  is  in  the  South  of 

o 

France.  I  was  married  at  the  age  of  fifteen  ;  but  I  was 
a  fine  young  woman  at  that  age,  as  fine  as  most  women 
of  twenty,  as  they  are  nowadays.  My  husband  was  a 
journeyman  baker.  He  married  me  because  of  my 
wooden  legs.  It  was  a  capital  dowry,  for  I  was  already 
well  known  in  Paris,  and  good  year  and  bad  year  together 
they  were  worth  about  2,000  francs  a  year.  I  made  my 
d^but  at  the  age  of  eight — on  March  17th,  1831.  At 
first  I  used  to  sell  flowers ;  then  I  learned  the  violin  and 
played  it." 

"  Then  you  have  been  a  public  figure  in  Paris " 

"  For  fifty-nine  years.  I  have  sat  where  you  have 
seen  me  sitting  for  the  last  twenty  years.  If  I  were  to 
tell  you  all  that  I  have  seen,  you  would  want  a  paper  as 
big  as  from  here  to  the  boulevards  to  print  it  in." 

I  asked  her  what  might  be  the  average  of  her  takings 
every  day. 


74  TWKNTV    YEARS    IN    PARIS 

"  If  I  were  to  say  that  seven  francs  is  the  average 
daily  takings,"  she  said,  "  I  should  be  speaking  very 
cheerfully.  Let  us  say  six  francs  and  tell  no  lies. 
Things  are  very  bad  just  now.  There  are  no  rich 
people  in  Paris  ;  at  least,  none  such  as  I  used  to  have 
for  customers.  There  was  a  time  when  my  affairs  really 
did  oo  well — but  now !  I  made  three  sous  to-day  ; 
some  days  1  make  nothing  ;  and  just  now,  as  I  have 
told  you,  I  ^mi  on  the  eve  of  being  turned  out  of  my 
lodgings. 

"  The  rich."  she  continued,  "  are  not  worth  what  they 
were.  They  have  no  more  generosity.  All  the  money  I 
now  take  is  given  by  the  poor — people  who  have  suffered 
or  who  have  seen  suffering  and  know  what  it  is.  I  sit  all 
day  with  my  back  to  one  of  the  oldest  and  richest  con- 
fectioner's shops  in  the  world.  In  the  afternoons  I  see 
rich  people  driving  up  in  their  carriages  with  splendid 
horses.  They  get  out,  bursting  with  good  food  ;  they 
go  into  that  shop,  stuff  themselves  still  fuller  with  the 
costliest  dainties,  spend  without  counting,  and  as  they 
come  out  I  jingle  my  key-rings  and  beat  a  tattoo  on  the 
pavement  with  my  wooden  legs.  One  would  think  that, 
being  so  rich  and  comfortable  and  so  full  of  good  things, 
they  would  be  disposed  to  be  charitable.  Not  a  bit ! 
Never  a  sou  do  I  get  from  one  of  them. 

"  The  Due  de  Nemours  is  a  personal  friend  of  mine. 
He  often  comes  and  chats  with  me  when  he  is  in  Paris. 
Don't  you  think  that  a  man  like  that  could  easily  give 
a  poor  woman  like  me  a  hundred-franc  note  now  and 
then,  to  help  me  pay  my  rent,  to  put  things  right,  and 
make  me  feel  comfortable  at  home  ?  But  oA  !  la,  la ! 
the  generosity  of  the  d'Orleans !  I  shall  not  be  lying 
when  I  tell  you  that  all  his  gifts  put  together,  since  I 
have  known  him,  do  not  amount  to  one  half  oi  the  coin 


SUPERSTITION    AND   CHARITY  75 

you  have  just  given  me.  I  wish,"  she  added,  "  that 
your  Prince  of  Wales  walked  on  the  boulevards.  They 
say  he  is  a  kind-hearted  man ;  but,  voilct,  he  doesn't 
walk." 

She  told  me  that  it  was  between  eleven  and  twelve 
in  the  forenoon  that  she  took  most  money  from  the 
public.  "  I  usually  make  half  my  day's  earnings  in  that 
hour.  People  are  only  generous  to  me  from  habit  or 
from  superstition.  Superstition ! — that  is  to  say,  that 
there  are  a  number  of  people  who  think  it  will  bring 
them  good  luck  to  be  generous  to  me,  and  on  the  eve 
of  some  big  race  will  give  me  small  sums  in  the  hope 
that  it  will  help  them  to  win." 

I  asked  her  whether  she  did  not  find  it  very  dull 
sitting  at  her  corner  all  day.  She  said  that  she  passed 
the  time  reading ;  indeed,  I  rarely  saw  her  without  a 
paper  in  her  hand. 

"  I  like  the  feuilleton  stories  so  much,"  she  said, 
"  especially  those  which  are  about  unhappy  loves.  But 
there  is  nothing  that  I  enjoy  more  in  the  day  than  Henri 
Rochefort's  daily  article  in  the  Intransigeantr 

While  she  was  telling  me  this  I  had  been  looking  at 
the  portrait  of  her  husband  behind  the  bed  on  which  I 
was  sitting. 

"  Have  you  been  long  a  widow  ? "  I  asked. 
"Oh!  poor  Lienard!  Did  I  tell  you  that  my  name 
was  Lienard — Marguerite  Augustina  Lienard  ?  My  poor 
husband  was  killed  in  the  Commune.  My  son,  who  was 
fighting  on  the  side  of  the  Communards,  was  engaged 
one  evening  in  removing  the  dead  on  the  boulevards. 
Suddenly  he  came  across  his  father's  corpse,  and, 
curiously  enough,  the  Communard  who  helped  him  to 
bring  poor  Lienard  home  afterwards  became  my  son- 
in-law." 


76  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

"  V^ous  ctcs  grandmcrc,  madamc  ?  "  I  said. 

"  No,"  she  answered.  "  They  had  a  little  girl,  but 
she  died." 

Before  I  took  leave  of  Madame  Lienard  she  was 
f^ood  enoui^h  to  ask  me  about  my  prospects  in  life.  She 
told  me  that  she  had  often  speculated  in  her  mind  on 
what  might  be  my  walk  in  life.  Because  I  was  clean 
shaven  she  had  at  first  taken  me  to  be  a  valet  looking 
for  a  place  ;  but  then  she  had  seen  me  in  cabs  and  on 
the  icrrasse  of  the  Cafe  de  la  Paix  opposite. 

"  I  am  a  writer,  madame,"  I  said. 

"Ah!  that  was  good  formerly.  That  was  good 
under  the  kinof.  It  was  a  cfood  trade  under  Louis- 
Philippe.  But  now  everybody  knows  how  to  write,  and 
there  is  nobody  to  whom  to  address  petitions." 

Madame  Lienard  understood  me  to  be  a  public  letter- 
writer.  When  I  first  came  to  Paris  there  were  still  a 
certain  number  of  these  scribes  to  be  found  in  little  sheds 
at  the  street-corners  ;  and  so  also  in  those  days  were 
there  carriers  of  water,  who  blew  a  horn  and  offered 
their  services.  These  were  picturesque  people,  swarthy 
men  from  Auvergne  ;  and  in  the  summer  months  it  was 
pleasant  and  refreshing  to  meet  them  with  their  dripping 
buckets  in  the  sultry  streets,  or  to  follow  in  their  track 
up  steep  and  stifling  staircases,  where  each  step  was 
splashed  and  looked  cool  in  the  sweltering  heat  of 
all  else. 

They  have  all  gone  now,  and  many  other  of  the 
picturesque  types  of  old  Paris  have  gone  with  them. 
Raffaeli  just  arrived  in  time  to  limn  some  of  these 
once  familiar  figures  which  modern  Paris  shall  never 
see  again,  extinct  now  as  are  the  types  of  Daumier  or 
of  Gavarni.  The  ^crizain  ptiblic,  such  as  Madame 
Lienard  took  me  to  be,  still  survives  here  and  there  in 


THE   VACANT   CORNER  ^^ 

Paris  in  remote  quarters.  His  ^choppe  may  be  found 
near  the  prisons  often.  But  he  is  not  the  confidential 
friend  and  adviser  of  the  illiterate  as  he  used  to  be. 
Too  often  he  combines  with  the  functions  of  letter- 
writer  the  less  honourable  trade  of  private  detective. 
He  has  been  suspected  of  giving  information  to  the 
police,  and,  being  a  depository  of  the  family  secrets  of 
his  quartier,  to  have  used  this  knowledge  for  extortion. 

I  never  knew  what  became  of  Madame  Lienard.  In 
cities  one  has  no  curiosity  as  to  those  who  disappear. 
One  day  one  said,  "  Tiens  !  the  old  woman  on  sticks 
isn't  at  her  corner,"  and  one  passed  on.  Some  believed 
her  to  have  retired  to  enjoy  in  splendour  the  rentes 
which  she  had  amassed.  Others  fancied  that  she  must 
be  dead,  "as  it  certainly  was  her  turn  to  be."  But 
nobody  cared.  For  myself  I  preferred  not  to  inquire. 
Life  has  taught  me  not  to  hunt  after  sad  emotions,  and  it 
pleased  me  to  believe  that  the  son-in-law  in  the  South  of 
France,  the  Communard  who  brought  the  dead  journey- 
man baker  home  to  the  woman  whom  he  had  married  for 
the  sake  of  her  wooden  legs,  might  have  taken  compassion 
on  her  lonely  and  miserable  life,  and  have  offered  her  a 
home  in  some  sunny  bastide  amidst  the  vines.  I  used  to 
picture  her  to  myself  sitting  in  the  farmhouse  kitchen 
during  the  long  veilldes,  knitting  by  the  resined  tallow- 
dip,  and  relating  to  the  eager  villagers  all  the  wonderful 
things  that  she  had  seen  in  Paris  during  the  sixty  odd 
years  that   she  had  shown  her  legs  for  a  living. 

And  the  fact  is  that  many  of  the  people  who  disappear 
from  Paris  and  are  supposed  to  have  died  under  circum- 
stances of  exceptional  sadness  are  found  to  be  living 
quietly  in  retreat,  enjoying  a  eupeptic  and  contemplative 
existence  far  from  the  crowd  and  the  noise.  Did  I  not 
one  afternoon  in  a  suburban  tramway  once  meet  the  great 


78  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Hortensc  Schneider  ?  W's,  the  Duchess  of  Gerolstein, 
tile  Grand-Duchess  of  Gerolstein  herself,  dressed  as  a 
petite  hourgcoisey  with  black  filoselle  mittens  where  the 
the  diamond  bracelets  used  to  be.  She  paid  the  con- 
ductor with  coppers  which  she  extracted  one  by  one  from 
a  housekeeping  purse,  and  she  anxiously  demanded  her 
transfer  ticket.  She  looked  very  respectable  ;  she  was 
plump  and  comfortable,  like  some  prosperous  middle- 
class  grandmother  who  has  lived  a  quiet  and  orderly  life. 
I  think  she  would  have  fainted  if  any  indiscreet  person 
had  reminded  her  of  the  old  imperial  days  and  the  petits 
soiipers  in  that  little  house  at  the  corner  of  the  Rue 
Lesueur,  facing  the  Avenue  de  I'lmperatrice.  Did  not 
one  hear  also,  quite  recently  it  seems  (though  it  is  fifteen 
years  ago),  of  the  death  at  Nice  of  Alphonse  Karr,  who 
for  close  on  twenty-five  years  had  disappeared  from  the 
boulevards  ;  and  did  we  not  all  re-echo  at  the  news  the 
words  of  Alexander  Dumas  on  a  similar  occasion  and 
cry,  "Quoi?  Encore?"     ("What?     Again?") 

These  people  who  disappear  while  it  is  yet  time 
from  the  turmoil  of  the  town  are  the  wise  people  of  the 
world.  Paris,  if  it  knows  of  the  retreat  of  such  a  one, 
smiles  and  says,  "  II  fait  son  petit  Cincinnatus,"  as  though 
that  were  the  most  foolish  thing  that  a  man  could  do. 
How  greatly  preferable  is  such  an  existence  to  that 
living  death  which  is  led  by  so  many,  who,  having  lost 
their  health,  their  fortunes,  their  powers,  persist  in 
walking  the  streets,  in  haunting  the  pleasure-places,  pale 
phantoms  of  their  former  selves.  I  remember  once  in 
the  Cafe  Royal  in  London  asking  a  friend  of  mine  who 
an  old  man  was  whom  I  always  saw  there  in  the 
afternoons  and  evenings,  who  appeared  to  have  few 
friends,  to  be  lonely,  and  from  the  way  the  waiters  spoke 
to    him,    poor.      "  Oh,     that    is ,"     said    my     friend. 


THE    DEAD   WHO   WALK   AGAIN        79 

"In  his  lifetime  he  was  a  great  painter,  a  true  artist. 
Then  he  died,  but  came  back  afterwards,  and  now  he  sits 
in  the  Cafe  Royal  all  day  and  most  of  the  night,  drinking 
little  glasses  of  brandy.  What  a  pity  it  is,"  he  added, 
"  that  dead  men  will  come  back  and  persist  in  showing 
themselves,  just  to  pretend  that  they  are  alive,  when 
everybody  knows  the  contrary  ! "  Those  words  have 
often  occurred  to  me  in  Paris  as  I  have  seen  drifting  past 
me  in  the  streets,  or  crouching  in  forlorn  attitudes  in  the 
public  resorts,  men  who  once  filled  the  town  with  the 
exuberance  of  their  lives.  And  perhaps  never  did  I  recall 
them  with  more  poignant  anguish  than  when  many  years 
later  it  fell  to  me  to  witness  this  living  death  of  the  very 
man  who  spoke  those  words. 


CHAPTER   VI 

The  Modern  "  Cour  des  Miracles" — Bibi-la-Puree — A  Survivor  of  the  Middle 
Ages — His  Mode  of  Life — His  Friendship  for  Verlaine — His  Last 
Impersonations — The  Old  Pole — A  King  Lear  of  the  Gutter — The 
Adventures  of  Fenine — "La  Revendication  Individuelle" — Our  Last 
Tryst — An  Englishman  in  Paris — A  Harboured  Resentment — The 
Lady  who  called. 

INDEED,  there  was  no  necessity  for  me  to  explore 
Paris  (as  Dumas  had  suggested)  in  search  of  the 
Cour  des  Miracles.  This,  since  the  days  which  Victor 
Hugo  pictured  in  his  N^otre  Dame  de  Paris,  has  left 
its  cantonments  and  has  spread  itself  all  over  the  city. 
In  the  course  of  a  life  such  as  mine,  which  took  me 
to  all  kinds  of  places,  and  which  brought  me  into 
contact  with  all  kinds  of  people,  I  have  met  in  Paris 
so  many  and  such  curious  types  of  the  class  to  which 
the  novelist  drew  my  attention,  that  I  can  people  in 
fancy  a  Cour  des  Miracles  fully  as  weird  as  that  mediaeval 
lazaretto  of  which  Paris  still  speaks  with  a  shudder. 
With  this  difference  :  my  Cour  des  Miracles  exhibits  no 
sores,  no  twisted  limbs,  no  horrid  ailments. 

To  the  outward  eye  my  adventurers  appear  much 
like  other  people,  a  little  more  shabby  doubtless,  but 
otherwise  difficult  to  differentiate  at  a  cursory  glance 
from  the  first  man  in  the  street.  Yet  in  their  way  of 
life,  in  the  resources  of  their  existence,  in  their  moral 
character,  they  entirely  resemble  their  less  hypocritical 

fore-runners  of  the  Middle  Ages.     They  will  not  work  ; 

80 


A   SURVIVAL   OF   THE    MIDDLE   AGES     8i 

they  never  have   worked ;  their  capacity  and  desire  for 
enjoyment  are  enormous. 

I  was  very  well  acquainted  for  years  with  that 
extraordinary  person  Bibi-Ia-Puree.  Of  him  it  may 
be  said  that  he  seemed  a  survival  of  the  Middle  Ages. 
His  home,  had  he  ever  had  one,  should  have  been 
in  the  Rue  de  la  Grande  Truanderie.  If  he  had 
lived  in  the  Middle  Ages  he  would  have  been  hanged. 
He  had  not,  like  Villon,  the  talents  which  appealed  to 
a  clever  king  and  twice  saved  the  poet's  neck  from 
the  halter.  Bibi-la-Puree's  real  name  was  Andre  Salis, 
and  he  was  very  proud  of  the  fact  that  he  was  a  nephew 
of  the  Abbe  Salis  who  gave  evidence  in  the  Tichborne 
trial,  and  who  had  been  tutor  to  the  real  Sir  Roger. 
He  was  the  son  of  a  marc  hand  de  vins  in  Angouleme, 
and  so  belonged  to  what  the  French  call  a  respectable 
family,  but  for  many  years  before  his  death  he  had 
cut  himself  adrift  from  all  his  relations,  and  the  only 
remnant  of  his  former  social  position  consisted  in  an 
annuity  of  three  hundred  francs,  which  he  used  to 
draw  at  an   insurance  office  four  times  a  year. 

In  the  Latin  Quarter,  which  was  largely  his  sphere 
of  activity,  a  mistaken  belief  prevailed  that  he  was  a 
student  of  law,  who  having  eternally  failed  in  his 
examinations  could  not  tear  himself  from  the  scenes 
of  his  academic  struggles.  We  all  knew  the  dtudiant 
de  quinzieme  ann(^e ;  here  was  the  dtiLdiant  de  trente- 
cinquieme.  But  this  was  not  the  case.  Bibi-la-Puree 
was  a  student  only  in   the  University  of  Life. 

On  the  quarter-days  on  which  he  used  to  draw  his 
annuity  it  was  not  an  unusual  experience  of  mine  for 
Bibi-la-Puree  to  drive  up  to  my  house  with  a  huge 
bouquet  in  his  hand  and  to  beg  me  to  accompany  him 
as  his  guest.      It  was,   it  appeared,  a  point  of  honour 

6 


82  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

with  him  that  that  same  night  every  penny  of  his 
seventy-five  francs  should  be  spent — '' boufft'''  he  used 
to  call  it.  And  thcnii^h  I  never  accompanied  him  on 
any  of  these  occasions,  I  used  otherwise  to  see  a  great 
deal  of  this  strange,  old  man,  more,  perhaps,  than  was 
good  for  my  reputation  as  an  honime  sdrieux ;  and 
I  remember  being  asked  one  night  by  a  commissary 
of  police  who  was  inquiring  into  my  identity  why  I 
chose  such  a  companion  for  excursions  into  the  lower 
depths  of  Paris.  I  answered  that  it  was  difficult,  not 
to  say  impossible,  to  find  sub-prefects  who  were  ready 
to  accompany  one  after  midnight.  If  I  had  cared  to 
explain,  I  should  have  said  that  the  study  of  Bibi-la- 
Puree  was  as  interesting  a  psychological  treat  as 
humanity  had  ever  offered  me.  Yes,  Bibi-la-Puree, 
who  now  had  the  face  of  Voltaire  and  now  of  Louis  XI. 
(the  very  monarch  who  would  have  hanged  him  in  his 
true  period)  took  one  straight  back  to  the  Middle 
Ages. 

I   had   often   regretted  that  it  had  not   been  my  lot 
to  live  in  the  days  of  Francois  Villon,  that  I   had    not 
met  that  strange  poet-thief ;    and  in   Bibi-la-Puree  one 
found  a  Villon,  or  perhaps  rather  a  Gringoire,  walking 
the    streets   of  Paris    at    the    close   of  the    nineteenth 
century.     Not  indeed  that  he   had   any  literary   attain- 
ments.    Indeed,  his  only  attaches  to  literature  were  his 
preference  for  the  society  of  writers,  his  long  friendship 
with  and  devotion  to  the  Poet  Verlaine,  and  a  superficial 
knowledge   of  what    the    young    men    of  the    Parisian 
Parnassus  were  writing.      Bui  in  his  manner  of  life,  in 
his  disregard  of  social  conventions,  in  his  hatred  of  the 
police,   in  his  constant  difficulties    with    the  gens  de   la 
justice   he    walked    the    streets    of   Paris,   pilfering   and 
light  of  heart,  a  Villon  redivivus.     Even  as    Villon   or 


BIBI-LA-PUREE'S   WEAKNESS  83 

Gringoire,  he  had  an  utter  detestation  of  the  bourgeois 
qua  bourgeois,  and  considered  him,  inasmuch  as  a 
Philistine,  his  natural  prey. 

In  a  eulogistic  notice  of  Bibi-la-Puree  which 
appeared  in  one  of  the  papers,  after  his  death  in  the 
Hotel-Dieu,  it  was  recorded  to  his  credit  that,  unlike 
his  prototypes,  he  was  honest.  This  is  not  the  case  ; 
and  without  his  weakness  for  peculation,  his  character 
would  have  lost  much  in  interest.  As  a  matter  of  fact 
he  had  served  one  sentence  of  a  year's  imprisonment 
for  stealing  a  brooch.  On  this  occasion,  as  in  all  his 
other  acts  of  larceny,  he  was  prompted  by  no  self- 
interest.  He  stole  because  it  was  in  his  nature  to  steal, 
just  as  a  magpie  pilfers.  You  had  to  grasp  this  fact 
if  you  wished  to  enjoy  his  society,  that,  like  the  Taffy 
of  the  nursery-rhyme,  Bibi  was  a  thief,  and  you  had  to 
take  your  precautions  accordingly. 

Whenever,  having  met  him  homeless  in  the  midnight 
streets  of  Paris,  I  had  given  him  a  night's  shelter  in  my 
house,  I  was  always  careful  before  parting  with  him  in 
the  morning  to  empty  his  pockets  of  such  trifles  as  he  had 
purloined  during  my  sleep.  What  he  stole — and  he  was 
always  stealing — was  immediately  presented  to  one  of  his 
friends.  For  instance,  he  often  used  to  leave  parcels  for 
me  at  my  concierge's — an  umbrella,  some  books  "  col- 
lected "  at  the  second-hand  stalls  on^the  quays,  and  on 
one  occasion  he  left  a  clock.  His  speciality,  however, 
as  I  have  mentioned  above,  was  the  stealing  of  umbrellas; 
and  when  he  entered  a  cafd  in  the  Latin  Quarter  or  in 
Montmartre,  you  saw  everybody  rushing  for  h.\s  parapluie. 
It  was  understood  that  this  was  one  of  his  amiable  weak- 
nesses, and  nobody,  I  am  sure,  ever  thought  of  informing 
against  him.  His  talents  in  this  direction  were  exercised 
much  on  behalf  of  his  friend  the  poet  Verlaine,  when  that 


84  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

<^reat  man  was  dying  of  want  and  sickness  in  liis  miser- 
able garret  in  the  Rue  St.  Victor.  Here  the  magpie 
disphiyed  the  amiable  qualities  of  the  raven  in  the  Bible 
story.  There  was  something  very  touching  in  this  asso- 
ciation of  the  genius  and  the  imbecile,  of  whom  one  had 
the  outward  appearance  and  the  other  the  sweetest  gifts 
of  the  mediaeval  poet,  who,  like  each  of  them,  had  suffered 
all  that  Paris  offers  of  suffering,  like  each  of  them  had 
lain  in  gaol.  It  is  recorded  that  at  Verlaine's  funeral,  at 
which  Bibi-la-Puree  represented  lafamillc,  and  led  the 
procession  of  mourners,  he  managed  to  gain  felonious 
possession  of  the  umbrella  of  Francois  Coppee. 

He  had  no  domicile,  he  had  no  means  of  existence,  and 
no  property  beyond  the  ragged  finery  in  which  he  walked 
about.  He  was  in  perpetual  masquerade.  He  usually 
wore  a  high  hat,  and  never  went  abroad  without  a  huge 
bouquet  in  his  ragged  frock-coat.  One  day  I  sent  him  to 
dispose  of  a  quantity  of  odds  and  ends  which  I  was  clearing 
out.  There  was  a  pair  of  spurs,  relics  of  my  Melton  days, 
amongst  this  lumber,  and,  item,  an  antique  helmet.  He 
was  to  dispose  of  these  at  a  second-hand  shop  at  Mont- 
martre,  and  he  was  to  bring  me  back  the  money,  for  that 
night  my  purse  was  empty.  But  I  saw  no  more,  that 
dinnerless  evening,  of  this  fraudulent  bailee.  I  heard, 
however,  that  he  had  been  seen  in  various  parts  of  Paris 
wearing  my  spurs  on  his  heels,  his  head  covered  with 
the  antique  helmet.  In  the  tails  of  his  frock-coat  he 
carried  a  pair  of  blacking-brushes  ;  but  his  skill  in  the  art 
of  polishing  boots  was  exercised  rather  for  the  benefit  of 
his  personal  friends  than  for  personal  gain.  You  asked 
Bibi-la-Puree  to  take  a  bock,  and  after  he  had  drunk  it 
he  would  kneel  down  in  front  of  everybody  in  the  cafd 
and  vigorously  black  your  boots. 

In  any   other  country — indeed,  in  almost  any  other 


THE    LAST    IMPERSONATIONS  85 

town  than  humane  and  tolerant  Paris — Bibi-la-Puree  would 
have  spent  his  life  in  prison.  In  England  he  would  have 
been  "dealt  with"  as  an  incorrigible  rogue  and  vagabond. 
Yes,  I  am  afraid  that  at  Quarter  Sessions  they  would 
have  ordered  poor  Bibi  to  be  birched.  In  Paris  the 
picturesque  harmlessness  of  his  character  was  so  well 
understood  that  the  very  magistrates  of  the  Correctional 
Police  used  to  treat  him  with  the  greatest  leniency.  He 
was  frequently  brought  before  them  for  insulting  the 
police,  against  whom  he  harboured  all  the  hatred  that 
was  entertained  for  the  guet  in  the  Cour  des  Miracles. 
Now  in  France  it  is  a  most  serious  offence  to  address 
"  outrages  "  to  a  policeman  in  the  execution  of  his  duty. 
It  may  entail  a  sentence  of  one  year's  imprisonment. 
Bibi  was  always  lightly  punished,  even  on  the  famous 
occasion  when  he  was  found  clambering  into  Monsieur 
Thiers's  house  on  the  Place  St.  Georges,  and  had  to  be 
removed  to  the  police-station  in  a  wheel-barrow,  in- 
veighing against  the  police  all  the  way,  and  clamouring 
for  the  halcyon  days  of  the  Republic  under  le  petit 
Foutriqtiet. 

He  died,  as  Gervaise  died,  of  exposure  and  want  and 
privation.  Tuberculosis  was  the  direct  cause,  and  his 
last  days  in  the  Hotel-Dieu  Hospital  were  easy.  He 
remained  a  buffoon  to  the  last,  and  the  very  evening  of 
the  night  on  which  he  died  he  was  masquerading  up  and 
down  the  ward,  bringing  smiles  to  lips  as  blanched  as 
his  own.  Dying,  he,  the  beggar,  enacted  for  these 
beggars  on  their  death-bed  the  many  trickeries  which 
had  been  their  trade  in  life.  In  the  penumbra  of  the 
long  room  he  mimicked  for  men  who  had  reached  their 
last  infirmity  the  mock  infirmities  by  which  they  had 
wrung  compassion  and  largesse  from  the  world  which 
they   were    leaving.     He    turned  back   his    eyelids  and 


^6  TWENTY    VI:ARS    IN    PARIS 

parodied  the  blind.  Me  doubled  back  his  hand  and 
showed  a  polished  stump.  He  feigned  the  man  who 
is  palsy  stricken,  and  amidst  the  coughing  cachinnations 
of  his  audience  of  experts  he  played  the  canting  beggar 
who  dupes  the  pious  at  the  doors  of  churches.  He  went 
out  of  a  world  which  had  not  been  kind  to  him, 
triumphant  and  mocking  to  his  last  breath.  He  died 
with  the  Vos  pla2idite  of  the  Roman  clown  expressed 
in  the  grin  of  his  lantern  jaws.  The  papers  recorded 
his  death  as  a  matter  of  public  interest,  told  the  story 
of  his  life,  and  spoke  gently  of  his  foibles. 

Another  of  my  strange  acquaintances  in  Paris  was 
that  fine,  aristocratic  old  man  who  for  years  used  to  be 
seen  in  the  end  room  of  the  Cafe  de  la  Paix  every  night 
of  the  year,  writing,  correcting  proofs,  and  wielding  a 
rubber  stamp.  He  was  an  object  of  curiosity  to  all  who 
saw  him  there  for  the  first  time,  and  I  think  that  many 
times  a  day  the  waiters  were  asked  about  him.  In  spite 
of  his  shabby  attire  he  was  evidently  quelquun.  In- 
deed, he  had  the  appearance  which  the  general  hold  to 
be  the  type  of  the  highest  nobility.  Some  thought  him 
a  king  in  exile,  and  truly  he  was  Lear  in  his  fall. 

His  name  was  Wladislas  Izycki  ;  he  was  of  a  noble 
Polish  family.  There  is  a  Polish  nobility,  in  spite  of  the 
fact  that  every  rascal  Pole  that  one  meets  away  from  his 
country  claims  to  be  of  aristocratic  birth.  I  am  not  sure 
that  Izycki  was  not  the  identical  vieux  Polonais  of 
Francois  Coppee's  story.  It  is  certain  that  he  had  been 
finally  ruined  at  the  Paris  gambling-tables,  and  that  for 
years  he  had  haunted  the  clubs  and  begged  of  successful 
gamblers  the  trifle  which  should  permit  him  to  try  his 
luck  once  more.  He  had  been  a  man  of  immense  fortune. 
He  had  all  the  extravagance  and  all  the  folly  of  the 
Polish  aristocrat.      His  generosity   was  unbounded  ;  his 


"LE   VIEUX   POLONAIS"  87 

contempt  for  money,  in  the  old  days,  unparalleled  even 
amongst  his  countrymen.  It  was  told  of  him  that  when 
he  came  of  age  his  brothers  complained  that,  though  the 
eldest  son,  the  zaniek,  or  family  mansion,  should  have 
been  left  to  him  by  their  father.  Had  not  each  one  of 
them  an  equal  right  to  it  ?  These  recriminations  dis- 
tressed him,  and  he  determined  to  bring  them  to  an  end. 
The  method  he  chose  was  characteristic.  He  invited 
them  to  his  estate  on  a  given  day,  and  when  they  arrived 
they  found  their  brother  waiting  to  greet  them  under  a 
tent.  The  palace  of  their  ancestors  had  been  razed  to 
the  ground,  and  the  earth  levelled.  "  I  hope  that  we 
shall  now  no  longer  quarrel  about  the  possession  of  the 
castle,"  he  said  to  his  brothers.  His  follies  and  ex- 
travagance were  at  one  time  the  talk  of  Europe.  He 
freighted  a  steamer  once  to  convey  him  across  the 
Atlantic  because  he  was  anxious  to  be  present  at  the 
ddbut  at  Chicago  of  a  ballerina  for  whom  he  had  a  kind- 
ness, and  had  missed  the  boat  by  which  she  had  sailed. 
He  would  have  appealed  to  Ouida  in  her  early  days. 
In  Paris  he  had  for  a  brief  season  been  the  talk  of  the 
gambling-clubs.  Some  of  the  banks  that  were  held  by 
Wladislas  Izycki  are  still  discussed  by  the  Greeks  of 
Europe  with  watering  mouths. 

The  catastrophe  was  not  long  in  coming.  A  final  blow 
was  dealt  to  his  fortunes  by  the  dishonesty  of  a  steward, 
by  which  he  was  robbed  of  his  remaining  estates  in 
Poland.  It  was  then  that  he  began  to  figure,  if  not  as 
the  real  vietix  Polonais  who  inspired  Copp^e's  tale,  at 
least  in  a  similar  part.  One  by  one  the  clubs  shut  their 
doors  on  him.  From  one  house  where  in  his  prosperous 
days  he  had  lost  a  million  francs  he  was  ejected  by  the 
police.  He  was  more  than  once  arrested  for  begging, 
and,  I  believe,  spent  some  days  in  prison  in  consequence. 


88  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Attcrw.irds  he  hud  attracted  the  attention  of  the  boulevards 
by  paradini^  Paris  dressed  in  sky-blue  clothes,  carryin^^  a 
red  parasol,  and  distributlii;^  prospectuses.  In  the  days 
when  I  came  to  know  him  he  was  living  by  playing  the 
flute  in  an  orchestra  in  a  small  cafe-concert  in  Montmartre. 
When  he  lost  this  employment  he  took  to  writing  begging 
letters.  He  knew  to  a  centime  what  were  the  charities 
of  all  the  rich  people  in  Paris.  His  delight  in  life  was 
to  be  able  to  sit  in  the  Cafe  de  la  Paix,  where  he  drank 
coffee  and  smoked  cigarettes  and  wrote  his  petitions. 

One  day  he  told  me  that  he  had  hit  upon  an  idea  for 
making  large  sums  of  money.  He  had  written  and  caused 
to  be  printed  a  little  four-page  pamphlet  in  Russian.  It  was 
a  grotesque  exposition  of  his  Socialistic  views,  accompanied 
by  a  description  of  his  own  woes.  His  name  and  address 
were  printed  at  the  bottom,  with  the  mention  that  the 
price  of  his  pamphlet  was  not  less  than  one  franc.  These 
papers  he  used  to  embellish  with  the  impress  of  a  rubber 
stamp  which  he  had  designed.  The  design,  he  explained, 
was  the  key  of  his  system  of  philosophy.  It  represented 
a  hand  with  the  fingers  and  thumb  outspread.  Each 
finger  bore  on  it  the  name  of  one  class  of  workers, 
ouvrier,  fabricant,  artiste.  He  said  that  the  producers 
were  the  only  people  who  ought  to  be  allowed  to  live  in 
a  w-ell-ordered  state,  and  he  called  his  system  la 
doigtologie.  He  afterwards  added,  in  the  centre  of  the 
hand,  a  picture  of  his  eldest  son.  He  spent  his  time  in 
the  Cafe  de  la  Paix  stamping  these  pamphlets  and 
addressing  them  to  all  the  celebrities  who  visited  Paris. 
I  used  to  hear  from  him  of  the  success  of  his  publications 
and  could  have  annotated  my  copy  of  the  Almanack  de 
Gotha  as  the  beggar's  true  guide.  It  appears  that  the 
King  of  Greece  was  always  '  good  for  a  louis,'  and  Izycki 
came  to  look  upon  the  Hellene  dole  as  part  of  his  income. 


THE    END   OF    IZYCKI  89 

There  were  granddukes  and  granddukes  :  this  one 
used  to  send  ten  roubles ;  this  other  left  the  missive 
unnoticed. 

As  long  as  he  confined  himself  to  addressing  his 
public  through  the  post,  the  picturesque  old  man  was 
not  interfered  with  by  the  managers  of  the  cap.  But  the 
time  came  when  he  thought  to  give  extension  to  his 
affairs  by  handing  round  his  leaflets  amongst  likely 
customers.  It  was  his  ill-fortune  one  day  to  hand  one  in 
which  there  were  some  coarse  pleasantries  about  the 
Russian  police  to  a  high  official  of  the  Petersburg 
Central  Of^ce.  This  person  at  once  complained  to  the 
management,  and  poor  Izycki  received  his  congd.  I 
think  that  this  final  humiliation  broke  his  heart.  I  saw 
him  later  shufBing  about  the  boulevards,  and,  when  the 
police  were  not  looking,  this  fine  old  man  would  stretch 
out  his  hand  for  alms. 

The  very  last  time  on  which  I  saw  him  he  came 
up  to  me  from  behind,  and,  without  a  word,  held 
out  his  hand.  I  took  his  arm  and  asked  him  how 
he  was  faring"  and  where  he  lived.  He  laughed  and 
said,  "  Under  the  Pont-Neuf  Come  and  see  me." 
Some  days  later  I  heard  that  he  had  been  found  dead  in 
the  small  room  to  which  I  had  assisted  him.  It  was  cold 
weather,  and  he  had  piled  all  the  furniture  in  the  room 
on  his  bed  to  add  to  the  warmth  of  the  blankets.  He 
left  nothing  behind  him  but  many  hundreds  of  empty 
matchboxes  and  a  great  number  of  letters  from  charitable 
people.  There  were  kings  and  emperors  amongst  his 
correspondents,  and  the  letters  would  have  been  estimated 
a  prize  by  many  collectors  of  autographs.  They  were, 
however,  impounded  by  the  police,  lest  they  should  fall 
into  the  hands  of  some  other  professional  writer  of 
letters. 


90  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

It  was  Izycki  who  iiurodiiccd  nic  to  another  of  the 
waifs  of  Paris,  a  man  of  whom  1  often  think  with  pity 
and  regret.  This  was  a  Russian  officer  named  Fenine, 
under  sentence  of  death  in  Russia,  and  for  years  a 
fugitive  in  France.  He  had  been  reared  at  the  College 
of  Nobles  in  Petersburg,  and  was  the  son  of  a  Russian 
officer  whose  name  is  still  proverbial  for  its  honesty  in 
the  Empire.  He  was  blind  of  one  eye,  and  had  the 
Kalmuk  type,  presenting  altogether  as  strong  a  contrast 
with  the  aristocratic-looking  Pole,  Izycki,  as  one  notices 
often  between  Poles  and  Russians.  I  am  always  struck 
with  this  racial  difference  when  I  compare  two  photo- 
graphs which  stand  in  my  study,  the  portrait  of  Henry k 
Sienkiewicz  and  that  of  Fedor  Dostoiewski.  All  his  life 
Fenine  had  been  filled  with  libertarian  impulses,  and  as 
an  officer,  quartered  in  Warsaw,  he  put  himself  on  the 
side  of  the  oppressed. 

He  was  mixed  up  in  one  of  the  recurrent  conspiracies 
in  that  city  of  disquiet  ;  the  conspiracy  was,  as  usual, 
made  known  to  the  police,  and  Fenine  was  forced  to  fly 
for  his  life.  "  I  was  in  total  ignorance,"  he  used  to  tell 
me  when  relating  this  passage  in  his  life,  "  that  we  had 
been  betrayed,  and  one  afternoon  was  walking  home  to 
my  house.  I  had  reached  the  corner  of  my  street,  when 
a  man  who  had  passed  me  turned  back,  caught  me  by  the 
arm,  and  whispered,  '  Are  you  Lieutenant  Fenine }  ' 
He  then  said,  '  Don't  go  home.  The  plot  has  been 
discovered,  and  the  police  are  hiding  in  your  room  to 
arrest  you.'  So  I  turned  round  on  my  heel  and  had  to 
face  the  world  again.  I  was  in  uniform  ;  I  had  barely  a 
couple  of  roubles  in  my  pocket  ;  a  price  was  set  upon  my 
head ;  the  hounds  were  at  my  very  heels.  In  the 
shortest  possible  time  I  had  to  find  a  disguise,  to  obtain 
money  for  my    flight,   and  to  get  outside  the  gates  of 


THE    ESCAPE    OF    FENINE  91 

Warsaw.  I  succeeded  in  all  these  things,  and  my  luck 
was  marvellous.  The  town  had  been  declared  in  a  state 
of  siege,  and  every  exit  was  closely  watched.  The  sentry 
at  the  gate  by  which  I  made  for  freedom  was  my  own 
orderly.  I  have  never  known  to  this  day  whether  he 
recognised  me  or  not.  At  any  rate,  I  was  allowed  to 
pass.  I  tramped  through  Poland  on  foot.  It  was  not 
till  I  had  got  a  good  way  into  Germany  that  my  friends 
were  able  to  send  me  a  little  money,  and  I  could  take 
the  train.  I  reached  Strasburg  unmolested  ;  but  at  the 
very  point  of  crossing  over  into  the  French  part  of  the 
station  the  German  soldiers  stopped  me.  Who  was  I  ? 
Where  were  my  papers  ?  I  gave  myself  up  for  lost. 
At  that  time  the  German  police  were  only  too  glad  to  be 
able  to  render  services  to  their  Russian  colleagues,  and  I 
should  have  been  arrested  and  sent  back  to  Warsaw,  the 
court-martial,  and  the  gallows.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  I 
had  already  been  tried  in  my  absence,  and  was  sentenced 
to  be  hanged.  However,  a  French  abbe  who  was 
present  interested  himself  in  me.  I  told  him  in  private, 
in  a  few  whispered  words,  who  I  was  and  what  I 
feared,  and  he  contrived  to  persuade  the  German  sentries 
to  let  me  pass." 

His  life  in  exile  had  been  one  long  period  of  want 
and  suffering.  The  days  had  gone  past  when  the  Poles 
were  welcomed  to  France.  Young  Floquet  might  cry 
out  in  front  of  the  Czar,  "  Vive  la  Pologne,  monsieur," 
and  so  found  his  political  career ;  but  the  general  public 
had  had  enough  of  the  Revolutionary  adventurers  who 
made  return  for  hospitality  with  every  kind  of  treachery. 
The  Wenceslas  Steinbock  of  Balzac  had  come  to  be 
recognised  as  a  true  type,  and  the  French  citizen  feared 
for  his  purse  and  his  domestic  honour.  Again,  poor 
Fenine  was  in    the  peculiar  position    that    he    was    not 


92  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

a  Pole,  but  one  of  the  race  of  their  oppressors,  and  on 
his  action,  which,  in  fact,  was  dictated  by  a  pure  spirit 
of  humanity  and  justice,  an  evil  construction  might  be 
put.  He  was  forced  to  gain  his  living  in  the  hardest 
manual  toil.  For  years  he  worked  in  an  iron  foundry, 
where  he  lost  the  sight  of  one  eye  through  an  accident. 
Amongst  the  declassed  he  was  one  of  the  most  cruelly 
declassed  ;  yet  his  love  of  humanity,  his  compassion  for 
the  sufferings  of  the  poor  never  grew  less. 

When  I  made  his  acquaintance  he  was  earning  a 
miserable  wage  as  occasional  secretary  to  a  rich  Polish 
refugee,  one  of  the  very  class  which  caused  the  downfall 
of  their  ancient  kingdom  ;  and  poor  Fenine,  who  had 
sacrificed  in  the  cause  of  Poland  his  life,  his  honour 
itself,  was  forced  to  write  at  this  man's  dictation  lying 
and  vainglorious  accounts  of  the  heroic  struggles  of  the 
Polish  nobility,  and  "  unutterably  foolish  "  suggestions  of 
the  way  in  which  Poland  might  yet  be  saved.  He  hated 
his  employer  as  rarely  one  man  ever  hated  another,  and 
he  used  to  pour  into  my  ear  the  indignation  with  which 
he  was  inspired.  I  said  to  him  on  one  occasion  that  it 
had  been  the  misfortune  of  his  life  that  he  had  always 
been  obliged  to  accept  employment  from  those  with 
whose  opinions  he  was  entirely  at  variance  ;  that  circum- 
stances, in  other  words,  forced  upon  him  the  role  of 
traitor. 

When  I  knew  him  he  had  developed  a  very  keen 
sympathy  with  Anarchist  principles,  though  he  was 
much  too  kind-hearted  ever  to  countenance  acts  of 
cruelty.  But  with  the  theory  of  every  man's  right 
to  practise  la  revendication  individuelle  he  entirely 
agreed,  and  took  delight  in  pilfering  whenever  the 
opportunity  offered.  One  day  he  said  to  me,  "  I  am  so 
sorry.     I    wanted    to   give   you  an   agreeable  surprise ; 


A   PROFESSOR   OF   RUSSIAN  93 

but  I  don't  think  I  shall  be  able  to  do  it.  The  old 
wretch  keeps  too  close  a  watch  upon  me."  I  asked  him 
what  he  meant,  and  he  explained  that  his  employer 
possessed  a  very  beautiful  inlaid  wood  paperknife.  *'  Just 
the  thing,"  he  added,  "that  would  look  nice  on  your 
writing-table.      I  made  up  my  mind  long  ago  to  get  it  for 

you  ;  but  old  D ,  who  is  as  cunning  as  he  is  mean, 

never  lets  me  go  out  of  his  sight." 

I  engaged  him  to  give  me  Russian  lessons,  and  it 
is  to  him  that  I  owe  any  knowledge  of  that  language 
which  I  possess.  But  my  education  was  gained  under 
trying  circumstances.  Poor  Fenine  had  the  vice  of 
many  of  his  countrymen  :  he  used  to  drink  very 
hard.  He  often  came  to  my  house  hopelessly  intoxicated; 
but  even  then  I  was  able  to  talk  with  him.  What 
brought  my  Russian  lessons  to  a  close  was  that  after 
a  while  he  ceased  coming  at  the  appointed  hour.  I 
was  very  busy,  and  could  only  spare  for  the  Russian 
lessons  the  hour  between  six  and  seven.  It  became 
quite  a  usual  thing  for  me  to  have  to  wait  till  a  quarter 
to  seven  without  any  news  of  my  professor.  At  that 
time,  generally,  a  man  in  an  apron  would  come  from 
some  neighbouring  wineshop  and  tell  me  that  a 
gentleman  was  waiting  for  me  at  that  establishment, 
and  that  my  immediate  attendance  there  was  desired. 
On  reaching  the  cafi,  I  used  to  find  Fenine  sitting 
behind  a  pile  of  saucers,  representing  as  many  glasses 
of  absinthe,  for  which  the  landlord  was  holding  him 
in  pawn. 

It  was  unfortunately  impossible  for  me  then,  for 
want  of  time,  to  encourage  these  amiable  eccentricities, 
and  in  the  end  our  relations  as  pupil  and  teacher  came 
to  a  close.  But  I  used  to  see  him  constantly  when 
he  came  to  call   on   me,   and    I    was   always    delighted 


94  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

with  the  man's  wonderful  conversation  and  vast  erudition. 
He  had  never  been  married,  but  he  had  an  adoration 
for  women,  and  his  great  grievance  against  the  social 
system  lay  in  the  injustice  which  is  meted  out  to  them. 
He  was  collecting  notes  for  a  book  which  he  proposed 
to  write  in  re-vindication  of  woman's  true  position  in 
society,  and  at  the  time  of  his  death  had  collected  an 
enormous  mass  of  matter. 

He  used  to  live  in  a  miserable  garret  in  the  Rue 
Visconti,  of  which  it  was  rumoured  in  the  quarter  that 
it  had  once  been  the  abode  of  the  great  Racine,  and 
which  was  close  to  the  house  in  which  Balzac  carried 
on  that  ill-fated  printing  business  which,  because  he 
there  bankrupted,  closed  the  doors  of  the  Academy 
against  him  for  ever.  Here  he  had  a  camp  bedstead; 
he  had  no  other  furniture.  Indeed,  there  was  no  room 
for  anything  else,  for  every  other  inch  of  space  was 
filled  with  books,  most  of  which  had  been  collected  on 
the  principle  of  la  revendication  individuelle.  There 
was  no  fireplace  in  the  room,  and  in  the  bitter  cold 
of  the  winter,  the  poor  fellow  used  to  burn  paper 
in  the  middle  of  the  stone  floor,  to  thaw  his  frozen 
fintrers. 

He  always  carried  a  broken  horseshoe  with  him — 
not  for  luck  indeed,  but  as  a  weapon  of  defence.  He 
was  ever  at  war  with  the  small  dealers,  whom  he 
accused  of  adulteration  and  dishonesty.  The  marchands 
de  vins,  the  tobacco  dealers  of  his  quarter,  had  all  in 
turn  to  listen  to  his  scathing  remarks  on  the  vileness 
of  their  deceptions.  He  used  to  imitate  with  his  fingers, 
for  their  confusion,  the  gesture  of  a  man  who  sprinkles 
water.  The  broken  horseshoe,  wielded  by  an  orator 
of  his  Herculean  strength,  served  to  underline  his 
arguments,  and  secured  him  liberty  of  speech. 


OUR    LAST   TRYST  95 

A  time  came  when  I  lost  sight  of  him  for  some 
months.  There  had  been  a  slight  difference  between 
us,  caused  by  la  revendication  individuelle.  I  had 
seen  in  the  papers  that  he  had  been  in  trouble  because 
of  his  friendship  for  some  militant  Anarchists,  and 
then  silence  had  settled  round  his  name.  One  day 
I  received  from  him  a  letter  saying  that  he  was  ill,  and 
becfpfingf  me  to  forsfet  the  triflino-  cause  of  our  dissension. 
I  at  once  wrote  back  and  told  him  that  as  soon  as  I 
returned  to  Paris  I  would  welcome  him  at  my  house. 
Some  time  afterwards  I  received  from  the  Sister  Superior 
at  a  convent  in  a  remote  part  of  Paris  a  letter  saying 
that  Fenine  had  been  very  pleased  with  my  letter, 
but  that  he  was  too  ill  and  "  tired "  to  come  and  see 
me.  He  prayed  I  might  visit  him  at  the  convent 
where  he  was  being  cared  for  by  the  holy  women. 

I  was  not  able  to  go  that  same  day  ;  but  on  the 
morrow  I  took  a  cab  and  drove  to  the  establishment. 
The  horse  was  a  bad  one,  and  we  made  slow  progress. 
The  place,  somewhere  behind  the  Gare  de  Lyon,  was 
a  long  way  off  my  home,  and  we  took  just  one  hour 
reaching  it.  If  that  wretched  horse  had  been  able  to 
cover  the  distance  in  only  five  minutes  less  time,  I 
should  have  been  spared  a  lasting  and  unsolaceable 
grief.  I  had  to  wait  for  a  few  moments  after  I  had 
rung  at  the  gates  of  the  convent.  When  the  door 
was  opened  and  I  had  told  the  blue-hooded  nun  whom 
I  had  come  to  see,  she  answered  :  "  Fenine  is  dead. 
He  died  just  as  you  rang  the  door-bell.  I  have  come 
from  his  bed."  She  took  me  to  his  side.  I  saw  that 
the  fingers  of  the  poor  gaunt  hands  that  were  crossed 
upon  the  white  coverlid  of  the  bed  were  stained  with  ink. 
I  suppose  that  until  almost  the  very  end  he  had  been 
working  at  the  book  which  was  to  sound  the  tocsin  of 


96  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

woman's  freedom.  Well,  there  were  kind  women  by 
him  when   he  died. 

I  j-iresume  that  Dumas  fils  moved  in  spheres  too 
exalted,  that  his  mansion  was  too  well  guarded  ;  for, 
otherwise,  surely  he  would  not  have  needed  to  regret 
that  time  and  opportunity  had  failed  him  to  study  the 
modern  Cour  des  Miracles  of  Paris.  It  forces  itself  upon 
you  at  every  step  ;  the  difficulty  is  to  know  how  to  avoid 
its  emissaries.  And  great  as  may  be  one's  kindness  for 
humanity,  it  is  sadly  disappointing  work  to  try  to  help 
most  of  the  people  whose  miseries  are  thus  obtruded  upon 
him.  They  belong  in  the  main  to  that  class  of  which  the 
Parisians  humorously  say  that  their  position  may  be 
summed  up  in  the  words  :  "  Pas  d'argent,  pas  de 
position,  mauvaise  reputation  et  pas  envie  de  bien  faire." 
It  is  just  that />as  envie  de  bien  faire  that  renders  the  task 
so  hopeless.  It  is  very  rare  indeed  that  one  has  the 
satisfaction  of  seeing  one's  efforts  resulting  in  anything 
but  most  transitory  benefit  to  those  one  wishes  to  help. 
I  do  not  mean  to  say  that  there  is  no  good  in  creating 
pleasing  incidents  in  the  lives  of  the  destitute  and  forlorn. 
I  hold,  on  the  contrary,  that  the  creator  of  any  incidents 
is  a  benefactor — to  the  extent  indeed  that  in  the  monotony 
of  a  country  life  I  have  sometimes  felt  actually  grateful 
to  the  little  wanton  boy  who  has  rung  at  my  door  and 
scurried  off.  He  created  an  incident  and  broke  with 
temporary  excitement  the  terrible  dulness  of  the  moment. 
But  one  hopes  to  do  more  than  to  give  momentary  pleasure. 
One  can  feed  the  man  buried  in  the  mine  through  a  tube, 
and  no  doubt  it  benefits  him,  but  one  would  like  to  help 
him  out  and  set  him  on  his  legs  again.  One  very  rarely 
succeeds,  and  the  remembrance  of  such  occasions  is  a 
pleasant  one. 

Once  when   I   was  living  in  a  very  poor  way  myself 


AN    ENGLISHMAN    IN    PARIS  97 

in  a  hotel  in  the  Rue  Lepelletier,  I  heard  that  there  was 
an  EngHshman  occupying  a  room  on  the  next  floor.  I 
was  told  that  he  was  engaged  in  literary  work,  and 
I  actually  found  myself  envying  him  his  employment. 
One  day,  however,  the  waiter  asked  me  if  I  would  not 
go  and  see  my  countryman,  whom  he  described  as  being  in 
a  dreadful  position.  I  clambered  up  a  kind  of  ladder  into 
a  loft,  and  there  was  shown  the  door  of  the  garret  where 
the  co7npatriote  resided.  It  was  a  dark  winter's  evening, 
and  when  I  had  opened  the  door  I  found  myself  in  black 
obscurity. 

"  Is  there  anybody  here  ?"  I  asked. 

A  quavering  voice  answered  me.  I  struck  a  match, 
and  saw  the  most  forlorn  object.  It  was  a  man  sitting 
on  a  broken-down  bedstead,  dressed  in  a  ragged  coat 
which  was  fastened  round  his  body  with  a  piece  of  cord. 
He  told  me  that  he  had  been  without  food  for  three  days, 
that  he  was  ashamed  to  go  out  into  the  streets  dressed 
as  he  was.  I  was  that  night  rrtyself  impransus;  but  there 
was  an  English  insurance  clerk  in  the  same  hotel,  and  he 
readily  came  to  the  rescue.  We  pawned  his  dress-clothes 
for  three  francs,  and  provided  for  the  immediate  want 
of  our  countryman.  He  was  in  a  dreadful  condition. 
His  rent  was  months  overdue,  he  had  no  work,  he  was 
without  clothes,  and  he  was  affected  with  a  loathsome 
and  disfiguring  skin  disease.  But  he  certainly  had  the 
envie  de  bien  faire.  He  had  come  to  France  some  years 
before  the  fall  of  the  Empire,  and  had  been  engaged  as 
a  tutor  in  the  house  of  one  of  the  Court  officials.  He 
had  seen  the  splendours  of  imperial  days,  and  had  been 
forced  to  contribute  his  scot  towards  the  royal  extrava- 
gance of  his  master,  "  who  dined  every  week  at  the 
Tuileries."  After  the  war  there  v/as  no  more  Tuileries  ; 
there  were  no  more  rich  charges  at  Court.     The  English 

7 


98  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

tutor  was  turm^d  out  by  liis  ruined  masters  without  a 
halfpenny  o(  long  arrears  of  salary.  When  I  came  to 
hear  of  him  he  was  entirely  without  employment ;  for 
some  months  previously  he  had  subsisted  by  sending 
short  news-paragraphs  to  the  Figaro.  Indeed,  in  former 
days  his  work  had  attracted  the  attention  of  the  great 
de  X'illemessant  himself;  the  editor  had  asked  who  it 
was  who  wrote  such  clever  things  in  so  apt  a  style  about 
the  doings  in  the  streets  of  Paris,  and,  astonished  to  hear 
that  they  were  the  work  of  an  Englishman,  invited  him 
to  his  table. 

"  But  I  had  no  clothes,"  said  my  new  friend,  "  and  I 
was  ashamed  to  go.     So  I  missed  making  my  fortune." 

After  that  the  Figaro  had  been  less  hospitable.  On 
many  pay-days  he  had  not  had  one  halfpenny  to  receive 
for  lineage  ;  and  hunger  had  often  driven  him  out  of  nights 
down  to  the  Central  Markets,  to  prowl  round  there,  even 
as  Claude  in  the  Ventre  de  Paris,  in  the  vain  hope  of 
earning  a  few  pence  by  helping  the  peasants  to  unload 
their  carts. 

When  I  got  to  know  him  better  I  found  the  man  the 
very  model  of  British  honesty.  He  was  most  character- 
istically English.  His  loyalty  to  our  Royal  Family  was 
such  that,  whenever  the  Prince  came  to  Paris,  he  used  to 
go  down  to  the  Place  Vendome  and  loiter  about,  to  the 
alarm  of  the  detectives,  for  the  purpose  of  raising  his  hat 
to  the  heir-apparent  of  the  British  throne.  His  twenty 
years  of  Paris  had  not  altered  in  a  particle  his  sturdy 
British  contempt  for  the  French  ;  even  his  Yorkshire 
accent  had  triumphed  over  the  acquired  tongue.  He 
considered  it  his  duty  to  his  country  to  be  as  careful  as 
possible  about  his  personal  appearance,  and  even  when 
in  rags  used  to  carry  a  pair  of  gloves,  of  unrecognisable 
colour  and  riddled  with  holes.     It  was  a  difficult  task  to 


A   HARBOURED    RESENTMENT         99 

drag  this  man  out  of  the  slough  into  which  circumstances 
and  a  lack  of  all  the  aggressive  qualities  had  plunged 
him,  and  it  was  years  before  I  was  able  to  help  him 
finally  to  his  feet. 

The  skin  disease  from  which  he  suffered  frightened 
people  of  him  ;  I  had  to  insist  at  length  on  his  amiable 
qualities  before  I  could  overcome  this  objection.      I  may 
conscientiously  say  that  I  worked  hard  and  constantly  for 
him.     I  was  so  interested  in  him  that  when  one  day  he 
told  me  that  the  great  sorrow  of  his  life  was  that  he  had 
not  seen   his   old   father  for  twenty  years,  and  that  he 
feared  lest  he  might  die  before  he  had  the  opportunity  of 
visiting  him,  or  rather  before  he  had  the  means  to  pay 
his  fare  to  the  Yorkshire  village  where  his  people  lived, 
I    immediately    bade    him    arrange    to   leave    Paris    the 
next    day,    and  straightway  took    him  over  to  England 
and  landed  him  safely  outside  the  Black  Swan  in  York. 
His    father    died  a  fortnight    after  I   had    brought   him 
back    to    Paris.     Eventually    he    got    together    a    good 
connection  as  tutor  and  as  translator  for  patent  agents, 
and  came  to  do  very  well  indeed.     At  the  same  time  his 
manner  became  more  and  more  distant  towards  me.     He 
gave  me  to  understand  that  he  had  much  resented,  at  the 
time,  my  entering  his  room  in  the  loft  of  the  hotel  in  the 
Rue   Lepelletier  without  knocking,    and    that   really  he 
had    never    forgiven    such    a    breach    of    the    common 
courtesies  of  life.      His  individualism  was  so  pronounced 
that  he  often  declared  that  the  forlorn  who  contrive  to 
induce  more  prosperous  people  to  assist  them  have  no 
need   to   feel   gratitude.      It    is    their  superiority   which 
helps  them  to  best  their  benefactors.     I  learned,  by  the 
way,  that  some  time  before    I   paid   for  his  journey   to 
York  and  back  he  had  inherited  from  an  Oxford  friend 
of  mine,  to  whom  I  had  introduced  him,  and  who  shot 


lOO  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS- 

himseir.  a  sum  oi"  fifty  pounds.  He  had  never  told  me 
a  word  of  this  ;  it  was  by  pure  accident  that  I  heard  it. 
I  ran  eagerly  to  communicate  the  good  news  to  him, 
and,   "  Oh,  yes,    I   had  it  !  "  he  told  me. 

Emissaries    from   the   Cour  des   Miracles   were   con- 
stantly calling  at  my  house,  until   I   removed  my  name 
from    the    annuary,    Lc     Tout-Paris.     I     thus    became 
acquainted  with  an  extraordinary  category  of  mendicants. 
In  ingenuity  and  plausibility  I  am  sure  that  no  city  can 
show    Impostors    more    efficient.     The    cleverness    with 
which  these  people  had  constructed,   on  the  narrow  basis 
of  the  bald  biographical  facts  which  appeared  next  to  my 
name  in  the  annuary,  a  story  which  was  likely  to  appeal 
to  my  compassion  always  filled  me  with  admiring  wonder. 
Unfortunately,  I  was  very  busy,  and  had  not  the  time  to 
listen  to  their  tales.      Men  it  was  easy  enough  to  get  rid  of; 
but  no  doubt,  because  of  this  fact,  the  impostors  tackled 
the  ladies,  and  sent  their  womenfolk  to  visit  the  men. 
I  shall  always  remember  an  old  lady  who  called   on 
me  one  mail-day,  just  as    I    was  sitting  down  to  write, 
against  time,  an  article  for  my  American   paper.     She 
was  very  neatly  dressed,  and  her  manner  was  civil  and 
insinuating.      But  almost  her  first  words  aroused  my  ire. 
She  represented  herself  to  be  the  daughter  of  a  former 
correspondent    of   the    Times   who    had    never    existed. 
I  did  very  much  object  to  listening  to  lies,  when  these 
had  been  fashioned   with    no  artistry    of  verisimilitude. 
Besides,  that  day  I  was  very  busy.     I  requested  the  old 
lady  to  leave  ;   I  told  her  that   I   was  tres  occupy.     She 
must  remember  how  feu  monsieur  son  pere  objected  to 
being  interrupted  when  in  the  throes  of  composition  for 
the  Times.     She  then  prayed  to  be  allowed  to  sit  down. 
She  felt  faint,  she  said.     I  could  not  refuse  this  request, 
and  turned  once  more  to  my  writing-table.     I  had  only 


THE    LADY   WHO    CALLED  loi 

just  the  time  in  which  to  finish  my  task.  My  employer 
was  not  a  man  to  allow  himself  to  be  disappointed  by  any 
of  his  correspondents.  It  was  the  hardest  work  to  write 
with  the  old  lady  sitting  there,  for  every  now  and  then 
she  gave  a  groan  to  remind  me  of  her  suffering  presence. 
But  I  took  no  heed.  She  was  too  obvious  an  impostor. 
At  last,  as  I  was  in  the  midst  of  an  effective  sentence, 
she  rose  to  her  feet,  threw  out  her  arms,  and  let  herself 
slip  backwards  on  to  the  floor.  I  knew  that  it  was  all  a 
sham  ;  but  I  was  naturally  forced  to  go  to  her  assistance. 
I  tried  to  raise  her  ;  she  made  herself  heavy  and  kept 
slipping  back  into  a  recumbent  position.  I  could  see  her 
eyes  twinkling  maliciously  behind  the  half-closed  lids. 
"  C'est  la  faim,"  she  muttered.  In  the  end  I  put  my 
hand  into  my  pocket  and  produced  a  coin.  At  the  sight 
of  it  she  sprang  to  her  feet,  snatched  the  money  out  of 
my  hand,  and  made  for  the  door.  Here  she  paused  and 
cried  out  some  words  of  triumph  and  derision.  No, 
there  is  never  any  need  in  Paris  to  go  in  search  of  the 
Cour  des  Miracles. 


CHAPTER   VII 

Baron  Haussmann — His  Home,  Rue  Boissy  d'Anglas — A  Pen-Portrait — 
The  Writing  of  his  Memoirs — His  Acknowledgment  of  Napoleon's 
Share  in  his  Work — His  Opposition  to  the  Franco-Prussian  War — 
Bismarck's  Rude  Reception  at  Biarritz — The  Real  Cause  of  the  War — 
Haussmann's\  Political  Opinions — The  Story  of  his  Career — His  Last 
Words — Paul  Deroul^de  and  'La  Revanche' — Old  Paris. 

THE  actual  site  of  the  mediaeval  Cour  des  Miracles 
was,  as  we  know,  in  the  neighbourhood  of  Notre 
Dame  des  Victoires,  in  one  of  the  picturesque  quarters 
of  old  Paris,  which,  under  the  Second  Empire,  were  so 
ruthlessly  swept  away  by  Baron  Haussmann.  I  must 
say  that  for  some  years  after  my  arrival  in  Paris  I  bore 
at  heart  a  grudge  against  this  man.  The  Paris  that  I 
loved  was  the  Paris  that  had  not  been  "  Haussmanised." 
I  used  to  hunt  out  in  midnight  rambles  such  narrow 
streets,  such  gabled  roofs,  such  memories  of  a  more 
romantic  age  as  the  city  could  still  afford.  I  still  feel 
at  times  a  revolt,  and  this  in  common  with  most 
Parisians,  at  the  mournful  monotony  of  the  architecture 
which  he  imposed.  The  Boulevard  Haussmann,  for 
instance,  at  all  times  depresses  him  who  passes  along 
it.      It  is  the  very  thoroughfare  of  stolid  ennui. 

But  for  the  man  himself,  after  I  had  come  to  know 
him,  I  felt  nothing  but  respect,  and  I  think  that  that 
opinion  is  now  the  general  one  in  Paris.  His  name 
has  been  disassociated  from  what  was  unworthy  in  the 
administration  to  which  he  belonged.     It  is  known  that 

102 


BARON    HAUSSMANN  103 

he  had  no  personal  ambitions  ;  that  he  never  sought  to 
enrich  himself.     He  took  no  part  in  any  Curde,  though 
the    opportunity  was    offered   to   him    of  amassing,    by 
speculations  in  house  property,  a  most  colossal  fortune. 
It  is  a  well-known  fact  that  he  laughingly  declined  the 
tide  of  duke  which  Napoleon  tried  to  force  upon  him. 
The  Emperor  desired  to  create  him  Due  de  Paris,  but 
Haussmann   reminded  him   that   there  was  a  Count  of 
Paris  who  had  better  claims  to  the  appanage  than  he. 
When  I   first   arrived   in  Paris,  in  1883,  Haussmann 
was  one  of  those  celebrities  who  had  disappeared  in  the 
way  I  have    referred    to   in  a  previous   chapter.     Most 
people  fancied  that   he  was  dead  :    he  went    nowhere  ; 
his    name    never   appeared    in   the    gazettes.       He    was 
living  in  retirement  in  the  heart  of  Paris,  a  disappointed, 
lonely,  and  unhappy  old  man.     He  was  an  irreconcilable 
opponent  of  the   Republican   form  of  government,  and 
seemed   to  regret  that   he  had   outlived   the  disaster  of 
Sedan  and  the  4th  of  September.      It  was  only  when  the 
announcement   appeared  that   his  Memoirs  were  to  be 
published — this    was    one   year    before   his    death — that 
people  realized  that  the  architect  of  modern  Paris  was 
still  living  in  their  midst.      It  was  about  this  time  that  I 
first   came  to  know  him    personally.     The  date  of  my 
first  long  conversation  with   him   is  one  of  those  dates 
which  one  does  not  readily  forget.     It  was  February  21, 
1890. 

I  had  a  warmly  worded  letter  of  introduction  to  the 
Baron,  and  but  for  it  I  do  not  think  that  I  should  have 
gained  access  to  the  old  man,  who  then  was  a  confirmed 
invalid.  His  door  was  closed  to  all  except  members  of 
his  family  and  his  oldest  friends.  But  my  letter  won 
me  access  to  him.  I  never  regretted  the  trouble  that 
I  had  taken  to  obtain  it. 


104  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

I  can  sec  as  clearly  as  though  my  visit  dated  but 
from  yesterday  the  various  details  of  the  home  of  the 
man  who  had  transformed  the  habitations  of  Paris.  The 
Baron  Haussmann  Hved  in  an  apartment  on  one  of 
the  upper  stories  of  a  house  in  the  Rue  Boissy  d'Anglas. 
It  was  not  a  Haussmann  house.  His  ante-chamber,  the 
hall  of  Parisian  apartments,  was  hung  with  ugly  brown 
curtains.  There  was  neither  style  nor  taste  in  any  of 
the  rooms  which  I  entered.  The  place  looked  as  though 
it  had  been  furnished,  certainly  regardless  of  expense, 
from  a  bric-a-brac  shop.  In  the  drawing-room,  where  1 
waited  some  time  before  I  was  received,  the  furniture 
was  rococo,  but  there  was  a  magnificent  suite  of 
Louis  XY.  chairs  amidst  this  harlequinade.  A  large 
and  beautiful  water-colour  drawing  of  Empress  Eugenie 
hung  over  one  of  the  gilt  consoles. 

The  Baron's  study,  however,  where  I  presented  myself, 
had  a  strong  individual  character.  All  the  man,  one 
might  say,  was  in  this  room.  The  politician  was 
shown  by  the  numerous  photographs  of  members  of  the 
Bonaparte  family,  signed  by  the  givers,  which  hung  in 
luxurious  frames  upon  the  walls.  A  large  portrait  of 
Napoleon  III.  met  one's  eyes  as  one  entered.  The 
furniture  was  in  the  style  administratif  \  the  chairs  were 
stiff-backed  and  covered  with  green  baize.  There  was 
a  large  square  writing-table  heaped  up  with  papers, 
orderly  disposed.  I  am  not  sure  that  a  stand  filled 
with  green  cardboard  boxes  was  not  to  be  seen  in  one 
corner  of  the  room.  The  Baron's  study  was  the  office 
of  a  Cabinet  Minister  not  too  certain  of  his  majority. 
The  vague  perfume  of  the  Third  Empire  invaded  the 
nostrils. 

The  Baron  received  me    sitting  in  a  low  armchair, 
that  fmiteiiil   Voltaire    to   which  all  invalids  in  France 


Photo  by  Pierre  Petit,  Fa 


BARON   HAUSSMANN. 


A    PORTRAIT   OF    HAUSSMANN        105 

used  to  come  in  their  old  days.  He  was  close  to  the 
fire,  and  his  back  was  turned  to  the  light.  Seen  thus, 
he  might  easily  have  been  taken  for  a  man  of  not  more 
than  fifty  years  of  age.  His  face,  which  was  clean- 
shaven, reminded  me  now  of  Goethe,  now  of  Words- 
worth ;  at  times  of  Christian,  the  Vaudeville  actor.  The 
touch  of  cabotinage  which  tinged  the  Third  Empire 
throughout  was  not  to  be  wanting  here.  Though  he 
coughed  sadly  all  the  time  that  I  was  with  him,  he 
seemed,  in  his  eighty-first  year,  to  be  wonderfully  well 
preserved.  He  used  no  spectacles,  his  voice  was  rich 
and  full,  and  he  appeared  at  least  to  have  all  his  teeth. 
In  some  way  that  I  cannot  define  he  constantly  reminded 
me  of  his  imperial  master  and  friend,  as  though  their 
long  association  had  left  on  the  servant  some  of  the 
personality  of  his  superior. 

His  manner  was  most  courteous  and  urbane.  He 
apologized  for  not  rising  to  welcome  me,  "  I  have  been 
very  ill,"  he  said,  "  and  cannot  move  about  much." 

He  added  that  the  publishing  of  his  Memoirs  was 
giving  him  great  trouble  and  no  little  anxiety. 

**  I  cannot  tell  you,"  he  said,  "  the  labour  that  this 
book  has  entailed  upon  me.  When  I  first  wrote  it,  it 
was  simply  with  the  intention  of  leaving  to  my  children  a 
story  of  my  private  and  my  public  life,  with  the  explana- 
tion of  the  hundred  and  one  things  that  in  the  one  or 
the  other  capacity  of  my  existence  may  have  puzzled 
them.  As  a  public  man,  I  have  had  to  do  many  things 
which  have  been  turned  into  reproaches  against  me» 
and  which  I  never  before  had  been  able  to  explain. 
It  was  my  intention  in  writing  my  Memoirs  to  furnish 
my  children  and  family  with  this  explanation.  However, 
friends  who  had  seen  the  manuscript  found  it  so 
interesting  a   contribution    to   history  that  they  begged 


io6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

me  to  publish  it  for  the  general  public,  and  after  some 
hesitation   I   consented  to  do  so. 

"  Hut  I  never  expected  that  getting  a  book  printed 
meant  such  a  lot  of  fuss  and  trouble.  My  publisher, 
Havard,  saw  the  manuscript,  said  it  was  very  good, 
and  began  printing  at  once.  Then,  when  the  first-proof 
was  ready,  he  came  to  me  and  said  that  there  were  too 
many  notes  at  the  bottom  of  the  pages,  and  that  I  must 
change  this,  because  the  public  did  not  like  to  be  con- 
stantly referred  to  the  bottom  of  the  pages.  After  that, 
he  found  that  my  chapters  were  much  too  long,  and 
I  had  to  arrange  all  the  subdivisions  of  the  book  over 
again.  '  Mon  Dieu,  monsieur,  quel  metier  ! '  It  serves 
me  right.  I  used  to  say  that  all  literary  folk  were  idlers. 
I  know  the  truth  now. 

"  Another  reason  why  I  want  to  publish  this  book 
is  to  give  the  Emperor  full  credit  for  his  share  in  the 
improvements  in  Paris  with  which  my  name  is  associated. 
He  deserves  far  more  credit  for  this  than  has  ever  been 
given  to  him.  If  you  do  me  the  honour  of  reading  my 
first  volume,  you  will  find  that  I  give  a  list  of  the  names 
of  the  many  colleagues  who  were  associated  with  me  in 
the  gigantic  work  of  transforming  the  shabby  Paris  which 
the  Emperor  found  when  he  came  to  his  throne  into 
the  beautiful  city  that  she  now  is.  At  the  head  of  the 
list  I  place  the  Emperor  himself  Nobody  so  well  as 
myself  knows  the  important  7'ole  he  played  in  the 
municipal  improvements.  It  was  he,  I  may  tell  you, 
who  first  designed  with  his  own  hands  the  plan  of  the 
wonderful  iron  Central  Markets,  which  were  afterwards 
constructed  by  Baltard.  I  may  say  that  there  is  hardly 
a  single  improvement  that  was  carried  out  in  Paris 
under  the  Empire  which  was  not  first  suggested  by 
Napoleon   III.     And  you  must  remember,  what  people 


THE    "NAPOLEONISATION"   OF    PARIS    107 

often  forget,  that  the  Haussmannisation — it  would  be 
fairer  to  call  it  the  Napoleonisation — of  Paris  consisted 
of  far  more  than  what  is  nowadays  understood  by  that 
term.  We  did  not  only  destroy  and  reconstitute  whole 
quarters  of  Paris  ;  we  improved  the  water  supply  enor- 
mously, we  built  canals,  we  laid  numerous  squares  and 
gardens.  '  Mon  Dieu,  monsieur,'  said  the  old  architect, 
leaning  back  in  his  y^^//^/«7  Voltaire  and  closing  his  eyes, 
'  quel  coup  de  pioche  ! '  " 

In  the  course  of  our  conversation  I  asked  Baron 
Haussmann  whether  he  had  taken  any  great  part  in  the 
politics  of  the  Empire.  He  said,  "  I  can  hardly  speak 
of  a  political  career.  I  could  speak  with  better  aptness 
of  my  reminiscences  of  political  affairs  with  which  I  was 
brought  into  contact.  I  have  never  assumed  the  role 
of  an  active  politician,  though  I  won't  deny  that  I  have 
very  strong  political  opinions.  It  was  my  duty  as 
Prefect  of  the  Seine  to  be  present  at  every  one  of  the 
Cabinet  Councils  which  were  held  under  the  Empire, 
and  the  whole  political  history  of  that  period  is  clear 
in  my  mind.  I  may  devote  a  fourth  volume  of  my 
Memoirs  to  this  part  of  my  experiences,  and  I  think  that 
I  should  be  able  to  give  the  public  some  very  interesting 
information.  I  am  well  aware  that  I  could  have  been 
infinitely  more  interesting  if  I  had  prepared  myself  all 
along  for  writing  a  book.  But  had  I  time  to  think 
of  Memoirs  in  my  active  days  ? 

"It  has  only  been  in  the  last  few  years  that  I  have 
made  up  my  mind  to  record  my  life  and  my  work.  I  have 
kept  no  notes  and  not  one  of  the  thousands  of  interesting 
documents  that  came  into  my  hands.  Only  think,  if  I 
had  collected  all  the  papers  that  came  my  way,  notes  from 
the  Emperor,  notes  from  the  Empress,  from  Bismarck, 
from  the  King  of  Prussia,  letters  from  everybody  of  note 


loS  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

and  oi^  importance  of  the  century, —  I  should  have  had 
the  material  for  a  score  of  volumes !  But  I  never 
attached  any  importance  to  these  documents.  I  was  far 
too  busy  to  collect  them  and  too  careless  to  preserve 
them." 

We  talked  of  Madame  Marianne,  the  Republic,  and 
it  was  interesting  to  me  to  hear  the  way  in  which  he 
spoke  of  /a  gueiise,  as  poor  Paul  de  Cassagnac  always 
called  her. 

"  I  am,  and  always  have  been,  of  the  firm  opinion," 
Baron  Haussmann  told  me,  "that  there  is  no  other  form 
of  Government  possible  in  France  except  Empire.  I  am 
an  Imperialist  by  birth  and  by  conviction,  and  I  consider 
that  the  only  possible  form  of  democratic  government 
under  which  France  can  prosper  is  Empire.  France,  of 
all  peoples  in  the  world,  is  one  nation  ;  her  government 
should  be  one  also.  The  executive  should  be  stable,  by 
means  of  heredity,  with  the  sovereignty  of  the  people 
firmly  assured  and  protected.  The  title  worn  by  the 
chief  of  the  State  in  France  should  be  such  as  to  put 
his  dignity  on  a  par  with  that  of  the  loftiest  monarchs 
of  the  world. 

"  Those  are  my  opinions,  and,  having  given  them, 
I  need  hardly  say  what  I  think  of  General  Boulanger 
or  of  the  Republic  as  a  form  of  government.  I  will 
say,  however,  that  such  a  Republic  as  was  proposed  by 
Boulanger  could  never  have  taken  deep  root  in  France, 
and  that  for  the  reason  that  a  Republican  form  of 
Government,  no  matter  what  form  it  may  assume,  must 
and  always  will  be  antipathetic  to  the  hearts  of  French- 
men. France  may  put  up  with  a  Republic  for  some 
years,  for  many  years  ;  but  just  as  surely  as  water  finds 
its  way  eventually  back  to  the  sea,  so  also  will  France 
find  her  way  back    to  monarchical  government,    repre- 


HAUSSMANN'S    POLITICAL   DREAM     109 

senting  in  the  authority  of    one    man    the    sovereignty 
of  the  people. 

"  I  cannot  say  that  I  agreed  with  the  policy  followed 
by  the  Emperor.  I  was  the  strongest  opponent  of  the 
war  with  Prussia  that  lived  in  France.  It  was  all  along 
my  dream  and  my  hope  that  France  should  ally  herself 
with  Prussia,  so  that  by  the  consent  and  with  the  help 
of  that  State  she  might  obtain  the  Rhenish  provinces. 
My  reason  for  desiring  that  France  should  obtain  and 
hold  the  Rhenish  provinces  was,  first,  because  the  Rhine 
appears  to  be  destined  by  Nature  to  form  the  frontier 
between  France  and  Germany  ;  and,  secondly,  because 
it  is  from  the  Rhenish  provinces  that  the  French  people 
originate  ;  for,  as  you  know,  the  French  are  Franks, 
and  the  Franks  came  from  the  banks  of  the  Rhine. 
Personally,  as  a  descendant  of  the  Lords  of  Andernach, 
near  Cologne,  seven  generations  back,  I  had  special 
reasons  for  wishing  that  my  policy  might  be  put  into 
execution. 

"  Over  and  over  again  was  my  dream  near  to  its 
realization.  It  was  as  good  as  offered  us  by  the  Prusstans 
on  several  occasions.  When  Bismarck  came  to  sp£nd 
a  few  days  with  the  Emperor  and  the  Imperial  Family 
at  Biarritz  in  1864,  he  told  me  that  he  was  authorized 
to  propose  to  Napoleon  III.  that  Prussia,  in  return  for 
France's  using  her  influence  against  Austria,  and  thus 
assisting  Prussia  in  the  realization  of  her  dream  of 
founding  the  German  Empire  with  Prussia  at  its  head, 
would  arrange  for  the  retrocession  to  France  of  all  the 
territory  on  the  left  banks  of  the  Rhine.  But  there 
was  influence  in  favour  of  Austria  at  work  at  Court,  an 
influence  so  strong  that  Bismarck,  although  he  was 
a  guest,  was  received,  as  the  saying  is,  '  like  a  dog  in 
a  game  of  skittles.'     I   was  quite  ashamed  of  the  treat- 


no  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

ment  which  was  accorded  to  him  during  his  stay,  and 
I  feel  sure  that  much  of  his  bitterness  against  France 
was  caused  by  his  remembrance  of  that  visit  to  Biarritz. 
That  was  before  Sadowa. 

"  Of  course,  after  the  Austro-Prussian  war,  Prussia 
had  no  longer  any  need  of  our  assistance  against  Austria, 
and  the  Emperor,  in  his  anxiety  to  "court  the  cabbage 
and  the  goat  alike,"  or,  as  you  say  in  England,  "  to  run 
with  the  hare  and  hunt  with  the  hounds,"  had  missed 
a  splendid  opportunity.  Still,  even  then  my  project 
might  have  been  carried  into  effect,  because  the  German 
Empire  was  still  not  founded,  and  Prussia  would  still 
have  been  glad  of  an  alliance  with  France,  even  after 
Sadowa,  to  enable  her  to  carry  out  plans  which  even 
to-day  she  has  not  realized. 

"  It  was  at  that  time  that  I  was  frequently  sounded 
both  by  the  King  of  Prussia,  Herr  von  Bismarck,  and 
others,  as  to  the  chances  of  moving  the  Emperor  to 
conclude  such  an  alliance.  I  told  them  that  it  was 
useless  to  hope  to  move  Napoleon.  At  that  time  I 
knew  that  nothing  could  be  done  in  that  direction.  By 
that  time  I  had  recognized  the  omnipotence  of  the 
influence  that  drove  the  Emperor  to  sympathize  with 
Austria,  and  I  saw  that  no  consideration  would  have  any 
counter-effect.  This  influence  was  that  of  the  Empress 
Eugenie,  and  it  was  she  alone  who  all  along  turned 
the  Emperor  against  Prussia  and  made  him  espouse 
the  cause  of  Austria.  She  did  this,  firstly,  because  she 
is  a  Roman  Catholic,  and  because  her  sympathies  were 
accordingly  rather  with  Catholic  Austria  than  with 
Lutheran  Prussia ;  and  secondly,  and  chiefly,  because 
she  was  under  the  influence  of  her  very  deep  affection 
for  Madame  de  Metternich,  the  wife  of  the  Austrian 
Ambassador  to  France. 


THE  REAL  CAUSE  OF  THE  WAR  in 

"It  was  thanks  to  this  love  of  Austria  that  she  urged 
on  the  Emperor  to  take  the  first  opportunity  of  breaking 
the  power  of  Prussia,  and  hence  the  war  of  1870. 
That  war,  consequently,  was  caused  directly  by  little 
Madame  de  Metternich,  through  the  Empress  Eugenie 
and  her  paramount  influence  on  Napoleon  HI,  I,  as 
I  have  said,  opposed  it  all  along  ;  but  my  position  in  the 
Cabinet  Council  was  rather  one  of  mere  supernumerary 
or  figurant  than  of  councillor,  and  I  had  no  opinion  to 
give.  My  opinions  have  not  changed  since  those  days, 
and  I  still  believe  that  the  wisest  policy  that  France 
could  follow  would  be  to  join  a  triple  alliance  with  Ger- 
many and  Russia.  Germany  needs  ports  on  the  south. 
The  alliance  would  ensure  her  the  possession  of  Trieste. 
Thus  France  would  have  issue  on  the  Mediterranean, 
Germany  on  the  Adriatic,  and  Russia  on  the  Caspian 
Seas,  and  the  triple  alliance  would  command  the  south 
as  well  as  the  north,  and  be  absolute  masters  of  the 
world.  I  do  not  say  that  this  policy  is  advisable,  or 
even  possible,  to-day  ;  for  since  the  last  war  the  idea 
of  an  alliance  with  Prussia  must  be  distasteful  to  most 
Frenchmen.  But  I  still  think  that  the  future  power  of 
France  and  the  peace  of  Europe  lie  in  that  direction." 

On  another  occasion  Baron  Haussmann,  in  telling  me 
of  his  childhood  and  youth,  said  :  "  I  was  born  in  Paris 
in  1809.  My  people  destined  me  for  the  Civil  Service  ; 
but  no  child  under  the  First  Empire  could  dream  of 
becoming  anything  else  but  a  soldier,  and  it  was  from 
my  very  childhood  my  desire  to  follow  the  profession 
of  my  father,  who  was  an  officer.  It  was  about  that 
time  that  the  disasters  of  France  began,  the  battle  of 
Leipsic  and  the  invasion  of  France,  which  was  the 
consequence  of  Leipsic.  I  was  at  Chaville  all  that 
time,  and,  child  as  I    was,  I    suffered  as   much   as  any 


112  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Frencliman  at  the  disasters  of  my  country.  I  can 
remember  the  fcelini^  of  bitter  shame  that  came  over 
me  when  one  day,  after  a  skirmish  near  Versailles, 
I  saw  my  grandmother  and  her  women  forced  to  bind 
up  the  wounds  of  some  Bavarian  soldiers.  When  people 
talk  to  me  of  la  rez'anc/ie,  I  say  that  I  must  see  a  double 
revanche  to  be  satisfied:  that  of  1815  as  well  as  that 
of  1870. 

"  At  eleven  years  of  age  I  had  become  quite  a 
sturdy  youngster,  and  could  be  moved  to  Paris,  where 
I  entered  the  Lycee  Henri-Ouatre,  or,  as  it  is  now  called, 
the  Lycee  Condorcet.  From  the  Lycee  Henri-Ouatre 
I  went,  at  the  age  of  sixteen,  to  the  College  Bourbon. 
One  of  my  chums  was  the  Duke  of  Orleans.  Another 
chum  was  Alfred  de  Musset,  whom  we  used  to  call 
Mademoiselle  de  Musset,  because  he  was  so  slender, 
delicate,  and  fair.  None  of  us  ever  had  any  idea  that 
he  would  develop  into  the  charming  poet  that  he  after- 
wards became. 

"  As  soon  as  I  had  passed  my  baccalau7'dat  I  entered 
as  student  at  the  Law  School,  and  was  able  to  pass  my 
examination  as  Doctor  of  Law  in  1831.  It  was  during 
the  Revolution  of  July  that  I  won  my  first  decoration. 
I  cannot  say  that  I  deserved  it,  for  it  was  only  by  chance 
that  I  happened  to  be  present  at  the  7nelde  in  which 
I  received  the  wound  for  which  it  was  given  to  me. 
My  father  was  at  that  time  one  of  the  directors  and 
editors  of  Le  Temps,  which  contributed  not  a  little  to 
the  overthrow  of  the  Legitimist  cause.  My  father  was 
one  of  the  men  who  signed  the  famous  protestation 
of  the  journalists.  I  was  with  him  during  the  whole 
of  the  troubled  days  of  July,  when  our  presses  were 
seized  and  we  had  to  print  the  paper  in  the  cellar  with 
presses  that  had  been  hidden   there  for  the  emergency. 


HAUSSMANN'S    LAST   WORDS  113 

Monsieur  Thiers  did  not  at  that  time  behave  with  any- 
particular  courage ;  he  deserted  his  friends  of  La 
Nationale  to  seek  safety  in  the  country.  On  May  22, 
183 1,  I  was  attached  as  General  Secretary  to  the  Pre- 
fecture of  the  Department  of  Vienne.  Twenty-two  years 
later  I  came  to  Paris  to  occupy  the  post  of  Prefect 
of  the  Seine  which  I  continued  to  hold  until  the  fall  of 
the  Empire." 

On  this  occasion,  the  last  on  which  I  saw  him,  Baron 
Haussmann  had  promised  to  give  me  a  7'humd  of  his  poli- 
tical experiences,  together  with  some  personal  souvenirs 
of  the  Emperor,  whom  he  more  than  once  described  to  me 
as  un  grand  mdconnu.  But  from  the  first  moment  I  saw 
that  he  was  not  in  a  fit  state  to  talk.  He  coughed 
several  times  badly  whilst  he  was  telling  me  about  his 
boyhood,  and  indeed  I  was  rising  to  go  when  a  most 
violent  fit  of  coughing  seized  him.  For  an  instant  I  was 
in  terror  that  he  might  expire  before  my  eyes,  but  the 
servant  for  whom  he  had  rung  before  the  paroxysm  came 
on,  hurried  in,  administered  remedies,  and  brought  him 
round.  He  recovered,  but  he  was  then  so  exhausted  that 
I  prayed  him  to  defer  till  another  day  the  interesting  story 
that  he  had  promised  me.  I  remember  the  last  words 
he  said  to  me  as  though  they  had  just  been  spoken. 

"  Another  day,  77ion  ami  ?  Shall  we  ever  meet 
again  ?  I  may  be  carried  off  at  any  moment  by  one 
of  those  crises  which  you  have  just  witnessed.  May  it 
be  so.  I  look  forward  with  confidence  to  death,  and  my 
only  hope  is  that  death  may  find  me  standing  [debout) 
as  it  found  all  the  strong  men  of  my  generation.  I  shall 
leave  this  life,"  said  Baron  Haussmann,  "  if  not  with  an 
erect  head  as  formerly,  at  least  with  a  firm  heart ;  and  as 
to  the  things  of  the  world  beyond  the  grave,  full  of  hope 
in  the  merciful  justice  of  the   Most  High  God." 

8 


114  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

The  eyes  of  Baron  Haiissmann  were  dim  as  I  left  him. 
I  am  not  ashamed  to  say  that  mine  were  also.  Very 
shortly  after  this  visit  had  taken  place  his  door  was  shut 
to  everybody.      I   never  saw  him  again  in  life. 

I    do    not    think    that    his    Memoirs    attracted   much 
attention  ;  it  is   quite   certain   that    nobody    reads    them 
now  ;  the   Empire  and  all  that  it  broui^ht  forth  seem  so 
far  away.      People  have  forgotten.     Even  the  war  is  not 
remembered.     Talk  about  la  revanche,  which  was  quite 
common    even    at    the    time    when    I    first    met    Baron 
Haussmann,   is   now  restricted    to    a    few    of   the    more 
ardent    members    of  the  Ligiie  des  Patriotcs.     Perhaps 
now  that  Paul  Deroulede  is  returning  to  France  we  may 
hear    more    about    it.      It    is    what    the     French     call 
Deroulede's  craquette.     For  the  rest,  I  think  that  every- 
body who  loves  the  picturesqueness  of  politics   will   be 
pleased  that  Deroulede's  term  of  exile  has  been  reduced. 
He    introduces    a    dramatic    element    into    all    popular 
gatherings  for  which  one  cannot  be  sufficiently  grateful. 
His  is  a  striking  figure.     If  he  has  of  Don  Quixote  the 
appearance,  he  also  shows  his  chivalry.     I  have  always  had 
a  very  considerable  respect  for  Paul   Deroulede.      Like 
Henri  Rochefort,  he  is  the  least  self-seeking  and   most 
honest    of   politicians.      He    suffers    under    this    terrible 
disadvantage    in  political   life  :    he    has    a   heart — under 
his  rugged  exterior  he  has  a  heart.      He  is  a  poet.      His 
Chants  cite  Soldat  have  a  peculiar  charm,  and  are  full  of 
power.     He  has  sacrificed  more  than  one  fortune  to  the 
cause  which  he  believes  to  be  just.     There  have  been 
times  when  he  has  been  on  the  verge  of  destitution  for 
this  reason.     But  his  pen  would  always  suffice  to  earn 
for  him  an  honourable  living. 

He  comes  of  literary   stock.      He    is    a    nephew   of 
Emile  Augier,  and  a  cousin  to  the  Bellocs,  Hilaire  and 


THE    QUIXOTISM    OF    DEROULEDE     115 

Marie  (Belloc-Lowndes),  who  have  won  in  their  youth 
as  distinguished  a  place  in  English  letters  as  their  mother 
has  enjoyed  for  years  past.  The  only  true  reproach 
that  can  be  made  against  Deroulede  is  that  he  is  not 
practical.  But  then  who  expects  a  poet  to  be  practical  ? 
He  is  not  destined  to  succeed  as  politician,  for  he  is  too 
honest  and  too  single-hearted  ;  and  besides,  the  Masonic 
loges  which  now  rule  France  will  have  none  of  a  man 
who  has  sympathy  with  the  Church.  But  he  will 
continue  to  charm  us  with  his  wild  and  impossible 
schemes  for  winning  back  to  France  the  military 
greatness  which  is  given  once  and  once  only  to  nations. 

It  was  very  interesting  to  hear  Baron  Haussmann 
talk  of  the  vieux  PaiHs,  which  he  demolished,  and  which 
many  still  regret.  I  have  often  deplored  that  I  kept  no 
record  of  the  things  he  told  me.  He  seemed  to  share 
my  admiration  for  picturesque  and  mediaeval  streets,  but 
he  was  convinced  that  air  and  hygiene  were  of  more 
importance  than  a  beauty  which  only  appeals  to  the 
few.  I  remember  his  particular  satisfaction  at  having 
demolished  the  fetid  quarter  through  which  the  Avenue 
de  rOpera  now  runs,  and  especially  his  pride  in  having 
transformed  the  quarter  of  the  Place  du  Chatelet. 
"  Cetait  une  cloaque,"  he  said.  It  was  through  this 
•'  cloaque "  that  ran  that  street,  the  Rue  de  la  Vieille- 
Lanterne,  where  hard  by  the  tavern  of  "  Veau  qui  Tette," 
Gerard  de  Nerval,  poet  and  lover  of  the  Queen  of  Sheba, 
was  found  hanging. 

One  had  always  understood  that  the  poet  committed 
suicide,  weary  of  life  and  of  debauch  ;  but  Haussmann 
maintained  that  he  had  been  assured  by  the  police  that 
Gerard,  de  Nerval  was  murdered.  There  were  two 
theories  to  account  for  the  motive  which  prompted  this 
crime  :    one    was    that    Gerard    de    Nerval    had    been 


ii6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

gambling  succcsstully  in  the  tavern,  and  that  he  was  Hrst 
robbed  and  then  killed;  the  other,  favoured  by  the  police 
at  the  time,  was  that  he  had  been  taken  for  a  police  spy 
by  the  ruffians  who  frequented  the  "  Veau  qui  Tette  "  and 
the  other  kens  of  Old  Lanthorne  Street.  To  police 
spies  even  to-day  in  Paris  mercy  is  never  shown.  The 
poet  had  the  habit  of  taking  notes  when  anything 
occurred  to  him,  an  idea,  a  turn  of  phrase,  and  this 
would  seem  suspicious  conduct  to  the  illiterate  brutes 
who  sat  about  him.  He  was  taken  for  a  mouchard  or 
a  7?W2don,  and  was  disposed  of  by  the  law  of  lynch. 

He  was  not  dead  when  he  was  found  danolinfj  from 
the  railing-  where  he  was  hanged  ;  but  those  who  found 
him  feared  to  touch  him  before  the  police  had  been 
fetched,  and  in  the  meanwhile  the  gentle  poet,  ceasing  to 
struggle,  had  breathed  his  last.  It  was  then  remembered 
that  he  had  once  asked  himself,  "  Dost  thou  absolutely 
wish  to  die  a  horizontal  death  ?  "  It  appears  that  the 
exact  spot  where  his  body  hung  was  where  is  now  the 
opening  of  the  prompter's  box  on  the  stage  of  Madame 
Sarah  Bernhardt's  theatre.  "  He  possibly  anticipated 
Sarah's  five  thousandth  performance  of  La  Dame  aiix 
Camdias  when  he  selected  that  spot  to  hang  himself," 
said  a  cynic  to  whom   I  once  mentioned  the  fact. 

In  the  days  before  I  knew  Baron  Haussmann  and 
had  grown  to  like  and  respect  him,  it  was  my  habit,  as  I 
wandered  about  Paris  and  found  some  architectural  relic 
of  the  past,  a  tortuous  street,  a  mediaeval  house,  a 
gabled  roof,  even  a  name  painted  at  a  street  corner 
which  dated  from  a  less  materialistic  age,  it  was  my 
habit,  I  say,  to  rub  my  hands  and,  addressing  an 
imaginary  Haussmann,  whom  I  represented  to  myself 
as  a  paunchy  man  with  whiskers,  to  exclaim,  "  Encore 
un  morceau  que  tu  n'auras  pas."      In  much  the  same  way 


OLD    PARIS  117 

as  to  this  very  hour  on  the  Breton  coast  the  fisherfolk 
after  a  hearty  meal,  remembering  what  they  have  heard 
their  fathers  tell  of  British  raids  upon  their  coasts,  will 
push  away  their  plates  and  with  a  sigh  of  satisfaction  cry 
out,  "  Encore  un  que  ces  cochons  d' Anglais  n'auront  pas." 
There  are  still  many  places  in  Paris  where  one  can 
plunge  into  the  middle  of  the  ages.  To  the  right  and 
the  left  of  the  Boulevard  St.  Michel  there  are  still  many 
quaint  streets.  But  it  was  in  one  of  these  streets  that 
only  the  other  day  I  had  a  sad  disappointment.  This  is 
the  street  known  as  Git-le-Coeur.  Written  so,  the  name 
implies  some  story  of  a  bleeding  heart,  some  far-off 
romance.  I  often  used  to  wonder  what  that  story  might 
be.  Well,  only  a  day  or  two  ago,  returning  there  again, 
I  happened  to  look  up  more  attentively  than  had  been 
my  custom  at  the  corner  where  the  name  is  enamelled  in 
white  letters  on  a  blue  ground,  "  Rue  Git-le-Coeur." 
Well,  below  the  enamelled  iron  plate,  I  then  for  the 
first  time  descried  hewn  in  the  stone,  and  painted  over 
with  yellow  paint  which  had  masked  the  lettering,  the 
old  name  of  the  street.  This  was  Rue  Gilles  Coeur.  It 
was  only  Giles  Coeur  Street  after  all,  and  all  the  romance 
was  fled. 

I  presume  that  when  the  street  plates  were  affixed 
throughout  Paris,  some  member  of  the  Commission 
which  had  to  do  with  this  quarter  of  Paris  thought  that 
Git-le-Coeur  would  sound  and  look  prettier  than  Gilles 
Coeur,  and  so  effaced  the  memorial  to  a  man  who  may 
have  been  a  worthy  burgher  under  Henri  Ouatre. 
Such  disappointments  are  not  unfrequent  to  those  who 
go  a-hunting  for  romance.  I  consoled  myself  by  walking 
on  to  the  Rue  Guenegaud  at  the  corner  of  the  Quai  de 
Conti  and  looking  at  the  wine-shop  which  stands  there, 
and  which,  like  all  mediaeval  wine-shops,  is  as  in  a  cage 


iis         T\vi:\rv  vi'ARs  i\  paris 

of  iron  bars.  In  the  former  times  all  taverns  had  thus, 
by  police  decree,  to  be  provided  with  iron  bars  both  as 
to  the  doors  and  to  the  windows.  This  was  not  to 
protect  the  tavern  keeper  from  the  street,  but  to  protect 
the  street  from  the  people  in  the  tavern.  These  might 
cut  their  throats  within  the  bars  as  much  as  they  pleased, 
and  throw  their  pots  and  brandish  chairs.  The  burghers 
passing  in  the  street  were  secure  because  the  iron  bars 
(which  had  to  be  painted  red  for  danger  signal)  kept 
close  and  tight  the  wild  beasts — the  Francis  Archers 
and  other  drunken  serving-men  with  knives  for  killing 
INIarlowes  in  tavern  brawls. 

Indeed,  at  every  step  almost  along  the  stretch  of 
quays  from  the  Place  St.  Michel  to  the  Pont  Royal 
there  is  something  to  recall  the  past  with  interest.  On 
the  very  last  occasion  when  I  was  with  Alphonse  Daudet, 
and  I  had  told  him  that  I  was  staying  at  the  Hotel 
V^oltaire  on  the  Quai  Voltaire,  he  said  to  me:  "You 
have  chosen  the  best  place  in  Paris  where  to  live. 
You  are  surrounded  with  noble  memories.  When  I  was 
a  young  man  I  spent  some  of  the  most  inspiring  days 
of  my  life  in  that  quarter."  He  added,  when  I  had  told 
him  that  I  was  moving  to  the  Rue  Condorcet :  "  Oh, 
why  leave  the  land  of  poetry  and  romance  to  plunge 
yourself  into  the  midst  of  la  potirriture  niont7itartraise 
(the  putridity  of  Montmartre)  ? " 

It  was  at  this  Hotel  Voltaire  that  I  first  saw  Oscar 
Wilde  as  a  young  man  in  the  full  bloom  of  his  genius. 
Here  it  was  that  one  night  I  once  aroused  Henry 
Harland  from  his  sleep  to  ask  him  to  serve  me  as  a 
second  in  a  duel  which  had  been  forced  upon  me.  Here 
I  once  dined  with  Rollinat,  the  poet  and  musician,  for 
whom  so  dreadful  a  fate  was  reserved. 

Further  on  is  the  house  where  is  the  bookshop,  now 


HOW   "LE    REVE"   WAS   WRITTEN     119 

owned  by  Monsieur   Honore  Champion,  which  used  to 
be  kept  by  the  father  of  Anatole  Thibaud  (better  known 
as  Anatole  France),  where  in   1844  the  future  master  of 
French   prose  was  born,  and   where   with   the  very  air 
which  he  breathed  the  child  sucked  in  his  love  of  letters. 
Champion,  by  the  way,  was  a  friend  of  Zola's.     They 
were    booksellers'    clerks    together,    and    it    is    Honore 
Champion's  boast  and  pride  that  it  was  he  who  prompted 
Zola   to   write  Le  Reve.      "  We  had    been    buying   an 
antique    manuscript    together,"    he    tells    one,    "  at    the 
Hotel   Drouot,   and,   as  we   were    walking   away,   I   re- 
proached him  that  his  Rougon-Macquart  family  was  but 
a  collection  of  the  very  worst    people    that   one   could 
conceive.      I   said,    *  Emile,  you   will    give    the  world  a 
very  poor  opinion  of  us  if  you  impose  your  Rougon- 
Macquarts  as  typical  of  a  modern  French  family.     We 
none  of  us  can   date   our    pedigrees  further  back   than 
the  Revolution.     Are  the  Rougon-Macquarts  to  be  con- 
sidered representative  of  the  new  France  which  blossomed 
on  the  ruins  of  the  old  ? '     I  said  that  it  was  not  natural 
that   every  member  of  a  family   should  be  so   entirely 
degenerate,  and  I  reminded  him  that  even  on  the  most 
decayed    of    forest    trees   one   finds    fresh   and    healthy 
shoots.     I   think  that  he  took  my  words  to  heart,  and 
that  Le  Reve  was  the  consequence  of  the  lecture  which 
I  gave  him." 

Still  further  on  is  the  house  where  once  stood  the 
Cafe  d'Orsay,  which  used  at  one  time  to  be  the  house 
of  call  of  young  men  of  letters  who  took  their  profession 
au  s^rieux.  Overhead  lived  the  daughter  of  Monsieur 
Buloz,  the  separated  wife  of  Maxime  Pailleron,  author  of 
Le  Monde  ou  Von  s  Ennuie,  and  in  an  adjoining  apartment, 
separated  from  his  wife's  home  only  by  a  door  which 
was  ever  kept  locked,  lived  Maxime  Pailleron  himself. 


I20  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

One  was  thus,  when  in  tlie  Cafe  d'Orsay,  below  stairs 
of  the  highest  life  in  the  world  of  letters,  and  each 
glance  at  the  decorated  ceiling  of  the  caf(^  was  the 
ad  asfra  glance  of  healthful  ambition.  Here  I  used  to 
meet  Bourget,  who  had  not  then  "arrived."  John 
Sergeant,  the  painter,  sometimes  came  there,  and  others 
whom  one  has  not  heard  of  since. 

From  the  terrace  of  this  caf(f  one  could  see  the  Rue 
de  Bac,  down  which  the  stream  used  to  flow,  on  whose 
banks  Marie  de  Rabutin-Chantal,  Marquise  de  Sevign^, 
lived  in  lettered  ease.  Tradition  of  the  noblest  kind 
peered  at  one  round  every  corner.  Not  very  far  away 
was  the  French  Academy.  Daudet  was  living  a  stone's 
throw  from  the  place,  and  hard  by  was  one  of  the  houses 
where  Gerard  de  Nerval  lived  his  most  productive  years. 
It  is  only  quite  recently  that  modern  Haussmanns, 
Haussmanns  only  in  their  ruthless  iconoclasm,  have 
begun  to  devastate  this  quarter  also. 


CHAPTER   VIII 

Ferdinand  de  Lesseps — On  the  Science  of  Antechambering — A  Meeting 
of  the  Council— His  Entire  Confidence — Countess  Kessler's  Dinner 
Party — An  Introduction  to  Magnard — De  Lesseps  to  the  Rescue — • 
De  Lesseps  and  the  Poor  Woman — The  Report  of  his  Death — A 
Stock-jobbing  Manoeuvre — A  Drive  to  the  Institute. 

I  AM  not  at  all  certain  that  those  who  live  their  lives 
in  cities  have  not  often  reason  to  feel  thankful  to 
the  men  who  demolish  and  rebuild.  They  remove  what 
are  the  landmarks  in  one's  life  ;  they  do  away  with  places 
which  are  associated  in  one's  mind  with  men  and  women 
and  things  that  have  been  in  the  past ;  they  blunt  the 
edge  of  memory.  Now  it  is,  I  am  afraid,  the  experience 
of  most  who  have  passed  many  years  in  one  town  that 
to  remember  is  to  mourn. 

There  is,  for  an  instance,  a  certain  spot  in  the 
Avenue  des  Champs  Elysees  which  formerly  used  to 
bring  back  to  my  mind  the  remembrance  that  it  was 
there  that  for  the  first  time  I  saw  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps. 
The  fine  old  man  came  dashing  past  on  horseback, 
followed  in  gay  cavalcade  by  his  beautiful  children  on 
their  ponies.  That  was  twenty  years  ago,  and  for  a  long 
period  the  remembrance  was  indeed  a  pleasant  one ; 
such  a  splendid  cavalier  he  looked,  and  his  children  so 
bonny,  so  full  of  joy  and  life.  Then  came  the  days 
when  the  picture  so  evoked,  so  bright  and  gladsome, 
immediately  transformed  itself  into  the  mournful  vision 


122  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

of  the  old  m;in  as  I  saw  him  last,  surrounded  by  his 
children,  whom  grief  had  touched.  But  now,  since  the 
great  alterations  that  were  carried  out  in  this  part  of 
the  avenue  in  1900,  I  can  pass  that  way  with  no  fear 
lest  recollection  should  come  to  trouble  me.  It  is  alto- 
gether a  different  place  ;  the  scene  around  me  does  not 
jog  my  memory  at  all. 

It  was  three  years  after  I  first  saw  him  riding  so 
Sfallantlv  at  the  head  of  his  children — his  smala  he  used 
to  call  them,  in  remembrance  of  his  Egyptian  days — that 
I  came  to  know  him  ;  and  so  it  was  given  to  me  to  enjoy 
for  three  years  the  friendship  and  kindness  of  a  good 
and  noble  man.  My  admiration  for  him  was  unbounded. 
It  is  a  trait  of  English  character  to  offer  a  homage 
almost  akin  to  worship  to  men  in  whom  great  energy 
has  survived  their  tale  of  years ;  and  here  was  a  man  of 
eighty-three,  who,  blithe  and  light-hearted,  had  engaged 
in  one  of  the  most  colossal  fights  for  which  enterprise 
has  ever  thrown  down  its  gauntlet.  He  was  so  young, 
he  was  so  merry,  so  debonair,  so  full  of  life  and  strength, 
that  he  appeared  to  me  to  be  one  of  the  most  wonderful 
old  men  that  the  world  had  ever  produced. 

Not  long  after  the  day  on  which  I  first  shook  hands 
with  him  he  did  me  an  act  of  kindness  which  bound  me 
to  him  with  chains  of  steel.  I  have  often  taken  a  secret 
and  malicious  joy,  whenever  the  name  of  Ferdinand  de 
Lesseps  has  been  mentioned  in  my  presence,  and  people 
have  made  haste  to  say  evil  things  about  him,  to  state 
that  I  owed  him  a  great  debt,  that  he  had  placed  me 
under  an  obligation  which  I  had  never  been  able  to 
repay.  I  then  have  watched  in  the  eyes  of  those  to  whom 
I  have  said  this  the  glint  of  query,  and  I  have  always 
been  able  to  read  the  question,  "  How  much  was  it  ?" 
I  give  them  no  information  ;  but  I  hug  myself  to  think 


MONSIEUR    LE    PRESIDENT  123 

of  what  It  really  was,  that  I  was  one  of  de  Lesseps'  most 
ardent  supporters,  the  champion  of  his  name  and  honour, 
at  a  time  when  to  go  with  the  world  one  had  to  cast 
stones  upon  his  ruined  greatness,  and  that  amongst  my 
treasured  autographs  is  a  letter  from  his  wife  in  which 
she  told  me  that  I  had  shown  myself  "  le  courtisan  de  la 
derniere  heure." 

The  proprietor  of  the  New  York  paper  for  which  in 
1887  I  was  acting  as  Paris  correspondent  was  a  personal 
friend  of  Monsieur  de  Lesseps,  and  for  this  reason  rather 
than  because  the  American  public  had  any  financial 
interests  in  the  Panama  Canal  Company,  he  had  directed 
me  to  call  on  Lesseps  and  keep  the  paper  informed  of  the 
progress  of  his  enterprise.  It  was  for  the  same  reason, 
no  doubt,  also,  that  to  a  letter  which  I  wrote  in  December 
of  that  year,  asking  to  be  allowed  to  call  on  him,  a 
most  courteous  invitation  to  attend  at  the  offices  of  the 
vSuez  Canal  Company  was  sent  in  reply  by  Monsieur 
le  President. 

For  at  the  offices  of  the  Suez  Canal  it  was  as  Monsieur 
le  President  and  as  Monsieur  le  President  alone  that  one 
had  to  ask  for  the  man  who  afterwards  came  to  be 
spoken  of  as  le  nom^nS  Lesseps.  I  can  remember  the 
indignation  with  which  one  of  the  liveried  huissiers  at 
the  palace  in  the  Rue  de  Charras  corrected  me  when  I 
asked  him  if  he  would  take  my  card  in  to  Monsieur  de 
Lesseps.  "  Monsieur  le  President,"  he  cried,  shaking 
his  head  in  indignation  at  my  disrespectfulness  till  the 
silver-gilt  chain  round  his  neck  rattled  again.  Then  he 
glanced  contemptuously  at  my  card,  and,  having  looked 
me  up  and  down  to  enforce  the  lesson  which  he  had 
just  given  me,  waved  his  hand  round  the  huge  hall  and 
asked,  "  What  likelihood  is  there  that  Monsieur  le 
President  will   be  able  to  receive  you  ? "     There  were 


124  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

over  a  hundred  people  waiting  an  audience,  most  of 
them  people  of  very  much  greater  importance  than  a 
mere  reporter.  I  recognised  several  deputies,  a  senator 
or  two,  and  some  of  the  best-known  engineers  and 
financiers  in  Paris.  "  For  the  rest,"  he  said,  "  Monsieur 
le  President  is  not  at  home."  Then  he  turned  his  back 
on  me  and  walked  away. 

There  was  a  deputy  there  whom  I  knew,  and  I 
learned  from  him  that  it  was  true  that  Lesseps  had  not 
yet  arrived,  "which,"  said  the  legislator,  "  is  preventing 
me  from  taking  my  apdritif  and  will  spoil  my  d(^jeunerj' 
One  has  not  the  time  in  the  rush  of  modern  life  to 
play  the  Dr.  Johnson  in  any  great  man's  antechamber, 
and  I  have  ever  found  it  a  good  thing  on  occasions 
like  this  so  to  place  myself  that  the  great  man  may  be 
aware  of  my  presence.  I  have  always  felt  sure  that  if 
Lord  Chesterfield  could  have  known  that  the  doctor  was 
waiting  outside,  the  occasion  for  a  famous  letter  would 
never  have  arisen,  and  I  cannot  look  at  a  certain  en- 
graving without  thinking  that  if  instead  of  moping  out  of 
sight  round  a  corner,  Doctor  Johnson  had  planted 
himself  squarely  in  the  passage  of  which  my  lord, 
finicking  in  his  chair,  had  an  uninterrupted  view,  Colley 
Gibber's  petty  triumph  would  have  been  but  a  short  one. 

On  this  occasion  I  decided  that  if  I  was  to  see 
Lesseps  that  day,  I  must  let  him  know,  what  the 
ktiissiers  would  not,  that  I  was  in  attendance ;  and 
accordingly  I  went  downstairs  and  waited  in  the  court- 
yard, where  Monsieur  le  President  would  see  me  as  soon 
as  he  alighted  from  his  carriage.  Presently  a  dashing 
brougham  drove  up  with  a  smart  coachman  on  the  box 
and  a  high-stepping  bay  between  the  shafts.  Monsieur 
de  Lesseps  was  inside,  and  seated  by  him  was  a  valet 
in  plain    clothes.       The    carriage    was  filled  with  toys, 


A   MEETING   OF   THE    COUNCIL       125 

Christmas  presents  and  Strennes  for  the  Httle  ones  at 
home.  I  was  dehghted  to  see  the  brisk  way  in  which 
the  count  opened  the  door  and  sprang  to  the  ground, 
and  the  firm  tread  with  which  he  walked  away.  I 
raised  my  hat  as  he  passed  me,  and  as  he  saluted  me 
in  return  I  mentioned  my  name.  Then  I  hurried  back 
to  the  antechamber,  and  bade  the  huissier  to  whom  I  had 
first  spoken  take  in  my  card  at  once.  There  was  a 
murmur  of  indignation  from  the  crowd  which  was 
waiting,  now  swollen  to  over  two  hundred  people.  The 
huissier  said  that  it  was  quite  useless,  that  Monsieur  le 
President  was  en  confdrence,  that  matters  of  the  highest 
importance  were  being  discussed  in  the  chambre  de  conseil, 
and  that  in  any  case  my  turn  would  come  after  all  these 
other  gentlemen  had  been  received. 

There  is  one  excellent  thing  about  the  new  journalism, 
and  that  is  that  it  dispels  all  false  modesty.  When  one 
has  either  to  do  or  to  "  get  left,"  and  when  to  get  left 
usually  means  to  die  of  hunger,  one  develops  remarkable 
energy  in  the  assertion  of  one's  personality.  I  roughly 
ordered  the  man  to  take  in  my  card,  and  asked  him  if 
he  thought  that  the  "  American  millions"  could  be  kept 
waiting,  no  matter  the  importance  of  the  things  under 
discussion  in  the  council  chamber.  He  may  have 
fancied  that  the  "  American  millions"  meant  dollars,  my 
mental  reservation  being  the  alleged  number  of  readers 
of  the  paper  which  I  represented,  for  he  appeared  awed, 
and  departed  with  my  card.  He  returned  in  a  very  short 
time  with  considerable  alacrity  and  actually  bowed  to  me. 
However,  for  the  benefit  of  the  gallery,  he  qualified  his 
announcement  that  Monsieur  le  President  was  expect- 
ing me,  and  that  I  could  be  received  at  once,  with 
the  remark  "  in  spite  of  the  urgent  affairs  under 
discussion." 


120  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

I  always  am  diffident  and  iccl  awkward  in  the  pre- 
sence of  men  of  business,  and  as  I  followed  the  liveried 
official  to  the  council  room,  I  felt  like  little  Oliver 
when  he  was  about  to  be  laid  before  the  Board.  A 
moment  later  the  hiiissier  had  ushered  me  into  a  magni- 
ficent room,  which  at  first  sight  appeared  to  me  to  be 
absolutely  empty.  A  long  table  covered  with  green 
baize,  and  set  out  with  that  array  of  stationery  which 
is  a  familiar  feature  of  board-rooms,  ran  down  the  centre 
of  the  apartment,  flanked  on  each  side  with  rows  of 
comfortable  fanteuils.  There  were  maps  on  the  walls, 
and  books  and  pamphlets  in  masses  on  various  pieces 
of  furniture  ;  but  where  was  the  Board  and  where  was 
Monsieur  le  President  ? 

Monsieur  de  Lesseps    was  sitting  by   the   fireplace, 
which    was    in    a   line    with    the  door   by   which   I    had 
entered.      He  was  simply  warming  his  hands  by  the  fire. 
He  got  up  when  he  saw  me  and  gave  me  a  very  pretty 
bow,   and  then  he  shook  hands.     He  was  good  enough 
to  say  that  he  was    very  pleased    to    see    me.       I   said 
that  I  had  understood  that  he  w^as  en  confh'ence^  and  he 
answered,   "  So    I   am.       With  the   fire,    the    tongs,   the 
poker,  and  the  shovel."     "  And  yonder,"  I  said,  pointing 
to  the  coal-scuttle,  "  is  no  doubt  the  gentleman  who  is 
to  join  the  Board  after  allotment?"     "And  why  so  ?  " 
asked    de    Lesseps.       "His    mouth    is    so    very    wide 
open,"    I   said.      He  laughed  at  this,  and  then  bade  me 
take  a  chair  and  sit  down  and  warm  myself.     "  C'est 
qu'il  ne   fait  pas  chaud  du  tout,"  he  said.     We  chatted 
on  various  topics  for  some  time  before  I  could  bring  him 
to  speak  about  the  Panama  Canal.     W^hat  he  then  did 
say  on  the  subject  I  desire   to   repeat,  for   I   think   that 
it  shows  his  absolute  sincerity  and  confidence    in    that 
ill-fated  enterprise,  which  was  to  bring  such  disaster  on 


DE    LESSEP'S   CONFIDENCE  127 

thousands  of  Frenchmen.  His  words  belong  to 
history. 

"  I  am,"  he  said,  "  as  full  of  confidence  as  ever. 
If  you  are  a  shareholder  in  the  Panama  Company,  let 
me  advise  you  to  put  your  shares  away  in  a  safe,  and 
to  bolt  and  bar  them  in.  We  shall  open  our  canal  at 
the  end  of  1889,  after  the  Exhibition  here,  or  at  the 
very  latest  at  the  beginning  of  1890.  That  is  certain. 
I  say  it  and  I  mean  it.  What  was  the  reason  of  the 
recent  fall  in  the  shares  ?  The  manoeuvres  of  certain 
rogues,  speculators  of  course,  who  trade  on  the  pusil- 
lanimity of  the  shareholders.  Just  before  that  fall 
thousands  of  copies  of  a  broadsheet,  headed  "  The 
Cataclysm  of  the  Canal  of  Panama,"  were  hawked  about 
Paris  and  thrust  upon  the  public.  An  abominable  lie, 
of  course,  but  one  which,  though  it  left  us  as  indifferent 
as  I  am  now  to  the  barking  of  that  dog  in  the  street, 
created  a  panic  among  some  of  the  shareholders.  As 
soon  as  the  speculators  had  got  what  they  wanted  the 
rumours  were  contradicted,  the  broadsheets  disappeared, 
and  the  shares  went  back. 

"No,  there  are  no  ways  of  putting  a  stop  to  these 
manoeuvres,  even  if  I  cared  to  trouble  to  do  so.  A  friend 
of  mine  who  had  bought  one  of  these  papers  hauled 
the  hawker  off  to  the  police-station,  and  charged  him 
with  obtaining  money  by  false  pretences.  He  got  two 
months.  But  I  find  it  best  to  treat  these  fellows  and 
the  rogues  who  set  them  at  work  with  the  contempt 
they  deserve.  I  confess,  though,  that  the  other  day  I 
laid  my  cane  about  the  back  of  one  of  these  hawkers. 
He  was  selling  a  sheet  with  something  of  a  very 
offensive  personal  nature.  I  don't  think  that  he  will 
offer  me  one  of  his  broadsheets  again  in  a  hurry.  How 
can  I  care  for  these  attacks,  when  I  have  never  cared 


128  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

for  difficulties  which,  compared  to  these  molehills,  have 
been  as  mountains  ? 

"Why,  did  I  not  go  right  through  with  the  Suez 
Canal,  and  need  I  recapitulate  all  the  opposition  that 
I  met  with  there  ?  Do  you  know  the  story  of  what 
occurred  on  the  very  evening  before  the  inauguration  ? 
It  was  at  a  grand  ball  at  the  Consulate.  About  mid- 
night in  the  middle  of  a  waltz,  a  Job's  messenger  of  a 
fellow,  with  a  face  as  long  as — that,  comes  to  me  from 
the  works,  and  whispers  to  me  that  a  dredging-boat 
laden  with  sand  had  sunk  and  made  the  canal  impassable. 
'  Blow  it  up  with  dynamite,  and  at  once,'  I  said,  and 
went  on  with  my  dance. 

"  The  following  day  was  my  wedding-day  also, 
I  must  tell  you.  Part  of  the  money  which  my  father- 
in-law  gave  me  in  dowry  with  my  wife  was  a  sum  of 
100,000  francs.  This  money  on  my  wedding-day,  as 
soon  as  I  had  received  it,  I  sent  to  Paris  and  bought 
Suez  Canal  shares  for  the  amount.  Well,  those 
100,000  francs  realised  1,500,000  francs  for  my  wife, 
and  it  is  with  800,000  francs  of  that  amount  that  I 
bought  for  her  the  house  she  now  possesses  in  the 
Avenue  Montaigne.  So  you  see  that  I  have  some  right 
to  have  confidence,  and,  as  I  tell  you,  I  have  full  con- 
fidence in  this  Panama  scheme.  Why,  at  one  time  the 
Suez  Canal  shares  were  down  to  150  francs,  and  that 
is  lower  than  the  Panama  shares  have  ever  ofone. 

"  As  to  the  Nicaraguan  expedition,"  he  said,  "  I  fear 
no  competition  at  all.  It  is  impossible  to  make  a  prac- 
tical canal  fit  for  ocean  traffic  with  fresh  water.  As  to 
all  the  other  canals  which  are  being  talked  of,  I  shall 
only  be  too  glad  to  see  the  Americans  make  them  in  as 
great  a  number  and  in  as  many  directions  as  possible. 
All  that  will  be  good  for  trade,  and  the  better  trade  is, 


THE    CO-OPERATION    OF    EIFFEL      129 

the  more  tolls  there  will  be  paid  at  the  gates  of  our  canal 
It  will  all  bring  grist  to  our  mill.  I  am  going  to  run 
over  to  Panama  towards  the  beginning  of  March,  and 
I  may  tell  you  that  I  am  taking  Eiffel  with  me.  We 
have  just  drawn  up  a  contract  with  Eiffel  &  Son  to 
construct  for  us  a  huge  lock  with  iron  gates  at  the  foot 
of  the  Culebra,  to  be  fed  with  the  waters  of  the  Chagrds 
river  there,  and  it  is  thanks  to  the  construction  of  this 
lock  that  we  shall  be  able  to  open  the  canal  by  the 
date  I  have  mentioned." 

More  than  once  in  the  course  of  his  remarks  about 
the  Panama  Company  he  advised  me,  if  I  were  a  share- 
holder, to  keep  fast  to  my  shares.  I  do  not  want  any 
better  proof  of  his  absolute  good  faith,  of  his  entire 
confidence  in  the  soundness  of  his  undertaking  than  that. 
I  do  not  suppose  that  Christophle  himself  or  any  other 
of  the  bitterest  enemies  of  "  the  great  Frenchman  "  would 
go  so  far  as  to  accuse  de  Lesseps  of  having  wilfully 
deceived  by  unnecessary  lies  a  young  man  who  was  not 
well  off 

I  was  so  pleased  with  the  kindness  of  my  reception 
and  so  interested  in  his  conversation  that  it  was  not 
until  much  later  that,  thinking  over  what  had  passed 
between  us,  I  recognised  that  possibly,  if  indeed  I  had 
been  a  shareholder,  I  might  have  felt  some  uneasiness,  in 
spite  of  the  entire  confidence  he  showed.  He  spoke  so 
lightly  of  the  difficulties  ;  he  seemed  to  think  that  the 
matter  was  not  one  that  wanted  discussing  at  all.  It 
appeared  to  me  that  he  took  far  more  pleasure  in  telling 
me  little  stories  and  making  little  jokes  than  in  talking 
of  business.  It  occurred  to  me  more  than  once  during 
the  course  of  our  conversation  that  the  crowd  of  suitors 
in  the  antechamber  believed  us  to  be  in  weighty  con- 
ference.    He  spent  quite  a  quarter  of  an  hour  in  telling 

9 


I30  TWENTY    YEARS    IN    PARIS 

me  about  a  recent  visit  of  his  to  Berlin,  and  the 
hospitality  which  had  been  shown  to  him  at  the  Prussian 
Court.  The  Emperor  had  been  very  kind  to  him,  and 
he  had  been  delighted  with  the  Empress.  He  also 
talked  about  Sir  Edward  Malet,  a  mutual  acquaintance, 
and  how  he  had  first  met  him  in   Egypt. 

And  apropos  of  Egypt,  he  suddenly  exclaimed,  "  You 
English  will  have  to  clear  out  of  Egypt.  You  will 
never  be  able  to  remain  there.  No  race  can  obtain 
absolute  possession  of  a  country  which  it  has  invaded 
unless  it  is  able  to  intermarry  with  the  subjected  natives 
and  absorb  the  inferior  race.  Egypt  must  be  for  the 
Egyptians,  and  for  the  simple  reason  that  no  inter- 
marriage between  Egyptians  and  foreigners  is  possible. 
Such  marriages  are  always  childless." 

I  left  him  that  day  feeling  full  of  enthusiasm  both  for 
the  man  and  the  enterprise.  After  I  had  left  the  room, 
he  opened  the  door  behind  me  and  came  a  little  way  out, 
beckoning  me  back.  "  You  must  come  to  the  Avenue 
Montaigne  and  see  us,"  he  said.  "  You  must  come -and 
have  ddjeuner  with  us  one  day.  I  want  you  to  see  my 
children,  all  my  children."  I  shall  not  forget  the  face  of 
the  huissier  with  the  gilt  chain  round  his  neck  when  he 
heard  Monsieur  le  President  saying  this  to  me.  It  was 
suffused  with  awe  and  respect,  and  he  sprang  forward  to 
pilot  me  through  the  vulgar  mob  that  crowded  the 
entrance-hall.  His  activity  with  his  hands  and  elbows 
on  my  behalf  was  surprising,  and  his  "  Way  there !  Way 
there !  Gentleman  from  the  Chambre  du  Conseil,"  was 
emphatic  as  to  my  importance.  I  suppose  that  he 
thought  that  he  could  not  be  energetic  enough  in  the 
service  of  the  representative  of  the  "  American  millions." 
It  may  never  have  occurred  to  him  that  Monsieur  de 
Lesseps  was  a  friendly  old   gentleman   who,    finding  a 


COUNTESS  KESSLER'S  DINNER-PARTY   131 

sympathetic  listener,  had  enjoyed  an  hour's  chat  about 
places  and  people  familiar  to  us  both. 

A  week  or  two  later  I  dined  one  night  at  the  house 
of  Count  Kessler  on  the  Cours-la-Reine.  The  Count 
was  married  to  an  Irish  lady  of  remarkable  beauty  and 
the  greatest  charm.  Their  house — they  entertained  very 
largely — was  one  of  the  very  best  houses  in  Paris.  One 
met  everybody  there.  The  countess's  little  dinners  had 
a  European  reputation.  Kessler  was  the  kindest  of  men 
and  an  admirable  host.  His  death  a  few  years  ago  left 
a  great  gap  in  Parisian  society. 

That  night  there  were  many  very  distinguished  people 
among  the  guests  who  were  assembled  in  the  drawing- 
room.  There  was  a  superfluous  king,  there  was  an 
American  railway  magnate,  there  was  the  needy  Princess 
Pierre  Bonaparte  and  her  millionaire  son  Roland,  there 
was  a  French  Minister  of  State,  there  was  the  editor  of 
the  Figaro,  and  a  number  of  other  people  of  note  and 
distinction.  Standing  with  his  back  to  the  fire  was  the 
grand  Frangais^  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps.  He  was  talking 
to  the  superfluous  king  and  the  railway  magnate,  and  a 
bevy  of  adoring  women  were  standing  around  the  group. 
I  was  very  pleased  to  see  a  man  there  whom  I  respected, 
but  it  never  occurred  to  me  that  he  would  remember  me, 
nor  did  I  expect  him  to  take  any  notice  of  a  person  whose 
intrinsic  insignificance  was  heightened  by  the  splendour 
of  the  company  in  which  he  found  himself. 

Shortly  before  dinner  was  announced,  Kessler  came 
up  to  me  and  said,  "Oh,  I  want  to  introduce  you  to 
Magnard,  the  editor  of  the  Figaro.  He's  a  man  you  ought 
to  know  in  Paris,  and  he  might  be  useful  to  you.  Come 
along."     Magnard  was  standing  in  the  very  centre  of  the 

drawing-room,  talking  to  G B ,  who  at  that  time 

was  one  of  the  editors  of  Le  Petit  Journal,  and  added 


132  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

considerably  to  his  income  by  teaching  foreign  prime 
donnc  how  to  pronounce  French.  I  had  heard  all  about 
him  from  Melba.  Magnard's  back  was  towards  us. 
The  Count  touched  him  on  the  shoulder  and  said,  "  Oh, 
Magnard,  here  is  a  young  confrere  of  yours  whom  I  want 
you  to  know.      It  is   Mr.   Robert  Sherard,  of  the  New 

York "      Having  said  this,   Kessler,  who  was  one 

of  the  most  vigilant  of  hosts,  darted  off  to  attend  to  the 
comfort  of  some  one  else.  Magnard  said  nothing,  but 
bowed  a  mock  bow,  bending  his  fat  little  body  in  two,  so 
that  his  hair  nearly  touched  the  points  of  his  shoes. 
Then  he  swung  round  on  his  heel,  presented  his  fat  back 

to  my  gaze,  and  quietly  went  on  talking  to  G B . 

I  never  felt  more  confused  in  my  life. 

This  scene  had  been  enacted  in  the  very  middle  of 
the  drawing-room,  and  had  been  noticed  by  everybody 
present.  I  confess  that  for  a  moment  I  had  it  in  mind 
to  step  back  and  take  a  drop  at  goal  with  the  plump 
rotundity  that  the  uncivil  editor  so  temptingly  displayed. 
Magnard's  pantomime,  of  course,  was  intended  to  convey 
to  me  and  to  the  lookers-on  that  the  editor  of  Le  Figaro 
was  a  man  of  far  too  great  importance  to  waste  even 
a  word  on  an  obscure  young  foreigner.  I  heard  more 
than  one  titter.  I  was  at  an  entire  loss  how  to  withdraw 
in  a  dignified  manner. 

At  that  moment  I  saw  a  movement  round  the  fireplace, 
and  I  heard  de  Lesseps  say,  "  Oh,  pardon  me,  but  I  see 
a  young  friend  of  mine  there.  I  must  go  and  speak  to 
him."  And  breaking  off  his  conversation  with  the  two 
kings,  and  passing  through  the  bevy  of  adoring  women, 
the  kind  old  gentleman  came  across  the  room  to  me  with 
outstretched  hands,  saying  such  flattering  things  as, 
"  Ouelle  bonne  surprise  !  Quel  plaisir  de  vous  revoir  !  " 
He  came  right  up  to  where  I  stood  in  utter  confusion, 


I 


DE    LESSEPS   TO    THE    RESCUE        133 

and  gripped  my  hand,  and  then,  taking  me  by  the  arm, 
drew  me  on  one  side — away  from  my  pillory — and  kept 
me  talking  with  him  until  dinner  was  announced.  It 
was  done  from  sheer  kindness.  He  had  seen  the  public 
affront  put  upon  me  ;  he  had  disapproved  of  the  rudeness 
shown  to  a  young  man  of  no  importance ;  he  had  given 
Magnard  and  those  who  had  applauded  his  buffoonery 
a  well-deserved  lesson.  The  effect  produced  was 
immediate,  for  in  those  days  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps  was 
still  one  of  the  most  important  persons  in  the  world.  I 
at  once  became  a  personage.  I  was  courted  at  table. 
In  the  smoking-room  afterwards  the  magnate  gave  me 
a  "  pointer  "  about  Milwaukees,  and  the  superfluous  king 
handed  me  his  gold  cigarette-case.  But,  better  than  this, 
Magnard  himself  came  up  to  me  and  made  himself  as 
pleasant  as  he  could.  He  hoped  that  I  would  call  on 
him  at  the  Figaro.  He  would  be  glad  to  receive  me  at 
any  time.  This  was  the  kindness  which  Lesseps  did  to 
me  ;  this  was  the  act  which  I  never  forgot. 

I  frequently  saw  him  afterwards.  Once  I  walked 
home  with  him  from  the  Rue  de  Charras  to  the  Avenue 
Montaigne.  From  the  number  of  times  we  were 
saluted  in  the  street,  I  could  gauge  the  extent  of  his 
popularity.  My  arm  quite  ached  from  raising  my  hand 
to  my  hat.  And  during  the  course  of  this  walk  I  had 
another  proof  how  entirely  his  confidence  was  still 
unshaken.  As  we  were  waiting  at  the  Rond-Point  in 
the  Champs-Elysees  to  cross  over  to  the  Avenue 
Montaigne,  a  woman  of  the  people,  recognising  Lesseps 
rushed  up  to  him,  and,  catching  hold  of  his  hand,  almost 
knelt  down  before  him,  imploring  him  to  tell  her  if 
"  Panama  was  good."  Was  she  to  keep  her  shares  }  He 
was  very  kind  to  her,  and  he  said  :  "  Parbleu  !  Panama 
is  good.     If  it  weren't  good,   ma  pauvre  dame,  do  you 


134  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

think  that  I,  a  phr  dc  famille,  would  have  put  all  the 
dowries  of  my  children  into  Panama  shares?"  The 
woman  went  away  radiant.  I  often  thought  of  her  after 
the  catastrophe. 

On  the  last  day  of  the  subscription  of  the  1888  loan, 
one  afternoon  a  newspaper  agency  telephoned  to  me 
to  tell  me  that  Lesseps  had  died  suddenly.  This  state- 
ment was  made  with  such  authority  that  I  immediately 
rang  up  the  Avenue  de  Montaigne.  A  minute  later  I 
had  heard  Madame  de  Lesseps'  laughing  denial.  She 
told  me  that  I  had  better  go  to  the  Suez  office  and 
convince  myself  of  the  falsehood  of  the  report.  I  found 
the  old  gentleman  in  the  company  of  General  Saussier, 
the  mammoth  governor  of  Paris,  and  another  man  who 
since  those  days  has  loomed  large  in  Panama's  affairs. 
It  was  Bunaud  Varrila.  Lesseps  introduced  him  to  me 
and  said,  "  This  is  our  chief  engineer.  He  has  just 
returned  from  Panama,  and  he  can  tell  you  that  every- 
thing is  going  on  very  well  out  there.  There  have  been 
no  cases  at  all  of  sickness  during  the  last  two  months." 
I  repeat  these  words  because  they  show  how  de  Lesseps 
was  being  misinformed.  Things  were  not  going  on  very 
well  in  Panama  on  the  canal  works  in  June,  1888,  and 
there  never  was  a  period  of  two  months  without  a  single 
case  of  sickness  amongst  the  workers. 

But  in  June,  1888,  there  were  still  millions  in  the 
Panama  cashbox,  and  it  was  to  the  interest  of  some 
people  to  keep  the  President  in  happy  ignorance  of  the 
true  state  of  things.  He  told  me  that  the  subscription 
was  a  success,  that  they  had  already  got  what  they 
wanted,  that  is  to  say,  enough  to  complete  the  work. 
"  The  subscription  would  have  been  still  more  successful 
but  for  this  last  manoeuvre,  the  report  of  my  death. 
Dead,  I  !     Is  it  not  amusing  ?     I   don't  look  very  much 


A   DRIVE    TO   THE   ACADEMY  135 

like  a  dead  man,  do  I  ?  I  am  in  better  health  and  in 
better  spirits  than  I  have  been  for  a  long  time.  This 
morning  I  took  a  three  hours'  ride  with  my  children  in 
the  Bois."  He  then  asked  me  which  way  I  was  going, 
and  when  I  told  him  that  I  had  no  particular  engagement 
he  asked  me  to  come  with  him  in  his  carriage.  He  was 
driving  over  to  the  Institute,  to  attend  a  sitting  of  the 
French  Academy. 

On  our  way  there  he  told  me  that  the  meeting  had 
been  called  to  hear  the  refusal  of  the  Government  to  the 
petition  sent  in  by  the  Academy  that  the  Due  d'Aumale 
might  be  allowed  to  return  to  France  from  exile.  He 
then  told  me  many  interesting  anecdotes  about  the 
duke,  and  referred  to  the  rumour  of  his  intention  to 
marry  the  Comtesse  de  Clinchamps.  De  Lesseps 
laughed  at  this  report.  "  I  have  known  Madame  de 
Clinchamps  a  long  time,"  he  said.  "  She  is  an  old  lady, 
older  than  the  Due  d'Aumale.  She  first  entered  his 
service  as  the  head  of  the  laundry  at  Chantilly.  She 
was  a  very  intelligent  woman,  and  the  duke  liked  her 
so  well  that  he  promoted  her  to  the  general  management 
of  his  palace.  Since  then  she  has  acted  as  gouvernante. 
I  fancy,  though,  that  if  the  duke  had  intended  to  remarry 
he  would  have  chosen  a  younger  woman." 

He  also  talked  about  the  trouble  that  there  was  then 
at  Chenonceaux,  where  Daniel  Wilson's  sister,  Madame 
Pelouze,  had  just  had  her  goods  seized  by  the  bailiffs. 
"  There  is  to  be  a  sale  there,"  he  said,  "  in  the  chateau 
where  Diane  de  Poictiers  lived  and  loved.  What  would 
Catherine  de  Medicis  have  said  to  find  bailiffs  in  her 
bedroom  ?  We  are  wondering  why  neither  Grevy  nor 
Wilson,  who  both  have  sacks  of  money  {(jtii  out  le  sac 
tous  les  deux),  don't  help  her  out  of  her  difficulty,  for 
the  credit  of  the  name.     Surely  there  have  been  enough 


1^6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 


o 


Wilson  scandals.  The  debts  amount  to  over  a  million 
and  a  half  francs,  and  include  such  miserable  amounts  as 
one  hundred  francs  owing  to  the  village  baker." 

He  was  very  merry  and  entertaining,  and  the  drive 
was  a  pleasant  one.     This  was,  however,  to  be  one  of 
the  last  occasions  when   I   was  in  his  company  which  I 
can  remember  with  gladness. 


CHAPTER    IX 

Ferdinand  de  Lesseps — Three  Years  Later — How  he  heard  of  the  Prosecu- 
ion — His  Resignation — His  Wife's  Courage — Widespread  Sympathy — 
An  Emperor's  Letter — The  Family's  Losses — His  Faith  in  Panama — 
His  DisHke  of  Speculation. 

THREE  years  later,  in  June  once  more,  and,  I 
think,  upon  the  very  anniversary  of  the  day  on 
which  I  had  had  that  pleasant  drive  with  Ferdinand  de 
Lesseps,  the  Academician,  from  the  mansion  of  the  Suez 
Canal  Company  to  the  Palace  of  the  Institute  of  France, 
I  was  once  more  in  his  company.  I  had  learned  that 
the  Government  had  at  last  decided  to  prosecute  those 
whom  it  pretended  to  hold  responsible  for  the  catas- 
trophe of  the  Panama  Canal  Company,  and  that  Count 
Ferdinand  de  Lesseps  and  his  son  Charles  were  to  be 
sacrificed  to  the  rancours  of  those  who  had  been  robbed 
of  their  money.  The  robbers  were  certain  people  whose 
names  are  notorious,  besides  a  number  of  deputies  and 
senators,  and  hundreds  of  journalists,  engineers,  financiers, 
blackmailers,  inventors,  politicians ;  and  every  one  of 
these,  with  the  exceptions  of  two  penitent  thieves,  who 
were  fools  enough  to  confess,  were  allowed  to  escape 
punishment  of  every  kind.  As  Madame  de  Lesseps 
wrote  to  me  in  1894,  "  Nos  ennuis  ne  sont  pas  finis, 
et  les  innocents  paient  pour  les  coupables."  The  inno- 
cent paid  for  the  guilty  right  through  in  this  miserable 
affair. 

137 


I3S  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

It  was  throuL^h  an  ill-conditioned  newspaper  reporter, 
so  Madame  dc  Lesseps  told  mc,  that  the  Count  and  his 
family  had  heard  that  the  prosecution  had  been  decided 
upon.  "  It  was  last  Thursday  evening,"  she  told  me. 
"  We  had  been  out  driving  together,  and  as  we  entered 
we  saw  a  man  arguing  with  our  concierge." 

"  A  difficult  thing  to  get  the  best  of  your  concierge, 
madame,"  I  said.  "He  has  the  reputation  amongst  the 
newspaper  men  in  Paris  of  being  most  devoted  to  your 
service.  He  is  as  discreet  as  the  tomb  ;  he  is  sturdy 
and  vigorous,  and  can  repel  any  attempts  to  reach  the 
staircase  with  violence  and  arms." 

"  Yes,"  she  said,  "he  is  a  splendid  servant.  But  all 
our  people  are  devoted  to  Monsieur  de  Lesseps.  You 
should  see  his  valet.  Well,"  she  continued,  "  as  soon 
as  this  man,  who  was  arguing  with  the  concierge,  saw  us 
come  in,  he  made  a  spring  forward,  and  managed  to 
escape  the  porter,  and  came  running  up  the  stairs  behind 
us,  with  the  porter  in  chase  behind  him.  The  Count 
saw  this,  and,  with  his  usual  kindness,  said,  '  Let  him 
come  up.  Come  up,  sir,' — and  he  came  up  and  followed 
us  into  this  room.  Monsieur  de  Lesseps  sat  down  there, 
and  the  reporter — oh,  he  was  such  an  ugly  man  ! — sat 
there.  Then,  without  any  preface  or  preamble,  he  came 
out  with  :  '  Can  you  tell  me  for  what  day  you  have 
been  summoned  before  the  Court  of  Appeal,  because, 
as  a  Grand  Cordon  of  the  Legion  of  Honour,  it  is,  of 
course,  before  the  Court  of  Appeal  that  you  will  have 
to  appear  to  answer  the  charges  made  against  you  with 
reference  to  Panama?'  I  jumped  up,  I  could  have 
boxed  his  ears.  '  How  dare  you,  sir?'  I  cried.  '  How 
dare  you  say  such  things  to  my  husband  ?  Mightn't  it 
have  killed  him  to  have  this  news  broken  to  him  like 
that?'" 


DE    LESSEPS    IN    ADVERSITY  139 

I  found  de  Lesseps  much  as  I  had  always  known 
him  His  eyes  were  still  bright,  and  he  carried  himself 
erect  ;  but  he  looked  pale  and  very  weary.  A  rug  was 
drawn  over  his  knees  as  he  sat  on  the  sofa,  though  it 
was  summer-time.  We  were  in  the  little  drawing-room 
on  the  entresol  of  the  house  in  the  Avenue  de  Montaigne, 
the  family-room,  as  it  might  be  called,  in  distinction  to 
the  apartments  of  State.  Here  de  Lesseps  used  to  play 
with  his  children.  The  room  that  day  was  filled  with 
a  delightful  bevy  of  little  folks,  beautiful  children,  with 
great  Spanish  eyes  and  curly  heads.  Poor  Madame  de 
Lesseps  was  in  black,  and  seemed  very  nervous  and 
exhausted.  "  I  keep  everybody  away  from  him,"  she 
said.  "  I  do  not  let  any  letters  reach  him.  He  is  a 
very  old  man,  and  he  is  not  the  same  as  he  was  before 
the  crash  came." 

Young  Ismail  de  Lesseps,  a  gentlemanly  young  man, 
was  in  the  room.  He  told  me  that  he  had  just  returned 
from  undergoing  his  examination  for  admission  to  St. 
Cyr  Military  College.  He  was  so  nice  and  gentle  to 
his  father  and  so  courteous  to  his  mother  that  I  liked 
him  from  the  very  first.  His  mother  was  saying  that  it 
had  been  very  hard  on  the  lad  to  have  a  difficult  exami- 
nation to  go  through,  and  to  have  all  these  troubles  to 
bear  besides.  I  can  hear  his  "  Mais  non,  maman  ;  mais 
non,  maman,"  still. 

With  his  usual  kindness,  de  Lesseps  made  room  for 
me  on  the  sofa,  and  I  sat  down  by  his  side.  He  patted 
my  hand  as  though  it  were  I  who  stood  in  need  of 
consolation  (as  indeed  I   did),  and  said  : 

"  I  have  had  my  good  days  and  I  have  had  my  bad 
days.     These  are  bad  days  ;  they  will  pass  like  the  rest." 

I  made  no  reference  to  the  catastrophe,  but  talked 
to  him  of  other  things.     I   told  him   the  gossip  of  the 


140  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

boulevard,  and  made  him  laugh  with  Aurelien  Scholl's 
latest  mot.  Every  now  and  then  one  of  the  children 
ran  up  and  hugged  and  kissed  the  old  man,  and  called 
him  "  Papa  cheri,"  and  it  was  pleasant  indeed  to  see  how 
his  face  lit  up  as  he  returned  their  caresses. 

I  had  a  long  talk  with  Madame  de  Lesseps  that 
afternoon,  and  I  admired  her  immensely  for  her  devotion 
to  her  husband.  It  was  a  great  blessing  that  the  poor 
old  man — he  was  eighty-six  then — had  this  splendid 
woman,  so  full  of  courage  and  energy,  by  his  side  when 
the  storm  broke  over  his  head. 

I  asked  her  how  he  was  bearing  it. 

She  said  :  "He  says  very  little.  He  is  not  what  he 
was  before  the  company  failed,  and  this  last  blow  has  had 
less  effect  upon  him  now  he  has  survived  the  failure  of 
his  great  ambition  three  years  than  it  would  have  had 
then.  He  is  easy,  with  an  easy  conscience.  His  only 
regret  is  for  France  and  for  the  faithful  who  followed 
him.  He  regrets  their  losses  bitterly.  He  has  often 
said  so  to  me,  and  I  know  that  it  is  so.  But  he  feels 
assured  that,  with  the  exception  of  the  yelping  curs 
from  the  blackmailing  offices  of  newspaper  and  finance 
blacklegs,  everybody  believes  in  his  sincerity.  And  that 
is  so.  We  have  had  proof  of  it  over  and  over  again. 
Look  at  all  these  letters." 

I  glanced  at  some  of  the  papers  which  the  Countess 
laid  before  me.  There  was  one  in  the  palsied  writing 
of  a  man  sick  abed,  which  spoke  of  "all  my  heartfelt 
sympathy,"  and  which  was  signed  :  "  Votre  vraiment 
bien  affectionne,  Dom  Pedro,"  coming  from  the  ex- 
Emperor  of  Brazil,  who  was  then  lying  ill  at  Vichy. 
A  high  dignitary  of  the  Catholic  Church  wrote  :  "  Mais 
il  est  ecrit  quelque  part  que  tous  les  grands  hommes 
auront  leur  Calvaire,  comme  le  divin  Maitre." 


Photo  by  Gerschel,  Paris. 

COMTESSE   DE   LESSEPS. 


MADAME    DE    LESSEPS'    DEFENCE      141 

"  I  have  hundreds  of  such  letters,"  she  said. 

Then  she  made  me  sit  down  right  opposite  to  her, 
and  said  :  "  I  want  to  talk  to  you.  I  have  got  a  lot  on 
my  heart,  and  it  will  relieve  me  if  I  can  say  it  right  out. 
Will  you  listen  to  me,  and  not  interrupt  me,  and  let  me 
go  on  to  the  end?     Then  I  will  give  you  tea." 

This  is  in  brief  what  she  wanted  to  say  to  me,  and 
said  with  her  eyes  flashing  and  her  colour  mounting  : 

"  I  am  a  God-fearing  woman,  and  I  believe  in  a  here- 
after, and  it  sometimes  seems  to  me  that  my  husband 
was  sent  on  earth  to  do  a  great  work,  and  that  he  is  an 
angel.  An  angel  he  certainly  is  in  simplicity  and  good- 
ness and  loyalty.  There  has  never  been  a  more  unselfish 
man  than  he  is.  His  whole  life  protests  against  the 
abominable  charges  that  his  enemies  are  making  against 
him.  He  devoted  himself  to  France.  He  wished  to 
bestow  on  France  the  splendid  enterprise  of  the  Panama 
Canal.  He  believed  in  it  heart  and  soul.  When  it 
failed  .  .  .  well,  you  have  seen  he  is  not  the  same  man. 
This  prosecution,  which  commences  with  my  husband's 
appearance  before  the  Court  of  Appeal  on  Monday  next, 
is  the  culminating  point  of  the  base  malice  and  ven- 
geance of  his  enemies.  Why  has  he  enemies  ?  Why, 
because  he  succeeded  ;  because  Suez  is  each  year  be- 
coming more  and  more  his  splendid  triumph.  Suez  is 
earning  so  much  money,  and  making  so  many  fortunes, 
that  it  prevents  many  an  envious  soul  from  sleeping. 
His  great  enemy  throughout  has  been  M.  Christophle, 
backed,   I  believe,  by  some  men  in  power. 

"  But  there  have  been  enemies  on  every  side.  Why, 
at  the  last  dmission,  as  we  know  for  a  fact,  a  thousand 
telegrams  were  sent  out  from  Paris  stating  that  my 
husband  had  committed  suicide,  and  publishing  other 
lies  with  the  object  of  spoiling  the  loan.     Till  then  the 


142  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

agents  dc  change  everywhere  had  been  assured  that  the 
loan  would  be  covered  three  times  over.  People  have 
never  pardoned  him  for  Suez.  The  foulest  stories  about 
him,  about  myself,  even,  have  been  made  current  over 
and  over  again.  Why,  about  ten  years  ago  it  was 
gravely  announced  that  I  had  eloped  with  a  captain  of 
artillery,  and  that  I  was  being  confined  clandestinely  in 
a  village  near  Paris.  A  very  probable  story,  nest-ce-pas  ? 
that  I  should  elope  with  an  artillery  captain  ! 

"  To-day,  when  our  enemies  have  succeeded,  as  they 
think,  in  bringing  disgrace  upon  him,  the  vilest  stories 
are  passed  about.  We  are  said  to  have  hoarded 
millions.  They  say  that  we  have  forty  millions  in  the 
Bank  of  England.  Where  are  these  forty  millions  ? 
The  contrary  is  true.  If  you  wish  to  convince  yourself 
of  it,  you  may  go  from  me  to  our  notary  and  our  solicitor. 
They  will  tell  you  the  exact  figure  of  the  sums  we  have 
lost :  I  have  not  got  it  at  the  tip  of  my  tongue,  but  there 
is  one  thing  that  I  do  know,  and  that  is,  that  before  the 
failure  of  the  Panama  Company  I  had  of  my  own  fortune 
a  sum  of  sixty  thousand  francs  coming  in  annually,  and 
that  that  has  all  been  swept  away.  I  know  that  when 
we  married  our  daughter  a  little  while  ago  we  gave  her 
a  dot  of  which  most  people  would  be  ashamed.  Yes, 
the  daughter  of  the  creator  of  Suez  received  a  marriage 
portion  of  a  bare  one  hundred  thousand  francs.  I  don't 
mean  to  say  that  we  are  totally  ruined,  but  I  mean  to 
say  that,  financially  speaking,  we  are  perhaps  the  largest 
sufferers  by  the  Panama  crash.  We  have  a  fortune  still, 
of  course,  which  we  derive  from  Monsieur  de  Lesseps' 
interest  in  Suez.  We  shan't  be  obliged  to  go  en  famille 
on  to  the  Pont  de  I'Alma  and  beg  for  our  bread.  Would 
it  be  fair,  do  you  think,  that  the  family  of  Ferdinand  de 
Lesseps,  who  gave  Suez  to  France,  should  hold  out  their 


DE    LESSEPS,    NO   SPECULATOR       143 

hands  on  the  Pont  de  I'Alma  ?  Yet  that  is  what  a  great 
many  people  seem  to  desire  to  see.  We  lost  all  that  we 
had  in  Panama.  It  is  an  infamous  lie  to  say  that  one 
centime  of  the  money  that  was  subscribed  to  that 
enterprise  benefited  us  in  any  way.  And  whilst  I  am 
speaking  about  this,  let  me  say  that  the  attacks  which 
are  being  made  against  Charles  de  Lesseps  and  my 
other  stepsons  are  one  in  point  of  infamy  with  the 
attacks  which  are  being  made  upon  us. 

"  Both  my  stepsons  are  thoroughly  honourable  men. 
Being  the  sons  of  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps,  they  could  not 
be  otherwise.  People  say  that  the  Count  knew  some 
time  beforehand  that  the  crash  was  comino-,  and  took  the 

o 

precaution  to  sell  out  all  his  shares.  It  is  exactly  the 
opposite  that  is  true.  Until  the  very  last  he  believed  in 
its  success. 

"I,  for  my  part,  was  very  nervous.  You  see,  it  was 
my  children's  fortunes  that  were  at  stake,  and  I  remember 
saying  to  him  on  one  occasion  that  perhaps  it  would  be 
more  judicious  to  invest  the  large  sums  which  we  had 
invested  in  the  Panama  Canal  shares,  in  some  more 
absolutely  safe  securities.  He  almost  got  angry  with 
me,  and  cried  out,  '  Madame,  are  the  children  my 
children  or  are  they  Rothschild's  children?  If  they 
are  Rothschild's  children,  let  us  think  of  securing  their 
fortunes  ;  if  they  are  mine,  they  shall  follow  my  fortune, 
and  stand  or  fall  with  me.'  And  so  the  money  went 
and  to-day  we  are  much  poorer  than  we  were  then. 

"  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps  is  not  a  speculator,  and  never 
has  been.  I  remember  that  when  Suez  Canal  shares  were 
standing  at  seven  hundred  francs  I  came  in  for  a  little 
residuary  legacy  from  my  father's  estate,  fifty  thousand 
francs  invested  in  Austrians,  and  I  said  to  my  husband  that 
I  thought  that  it  would  be  a  good  thing  to  sell  out  and 


144  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

invest  this  money  in  Suez,  as  I  believed  that  they  were 
certain  to  rise.  He  was  angry,  and  rebuked  me  for  my 
apparent  love  of  speculation,  and  would  not  allow  me  to 
sell  out ;  so  you  can  compute  just  what  that  cost  us  in 
hard  cash,  seeing  to  what  the  seven  hundred  franc 
shares  have  risen  since  then. 

"It  is  a  shame!"  she  cried,  springing  to  her  feet. 
"  Such  ingratitude  is  a  shame  !  But  it  is  the  fate  of  all 
great  men,  as  Monseigneur  writes  me  and  as  others 
have  written  to  me.  It  is  the  reward  of  greatness  to  be 
sacrificed.  Mention  one  great  man  in  France  who  has 
not  been  rewarded  in  this  way !  But  it  is  the  same  in 
other  countries.  One  need  but  remember  Columbus. 
But  I  don't  know  why  I  get  angry  like  this.  It  is  what 
one  must  expect  in  France,  governed  as  she  is  at 
present.  And,  moreover,  though  our  enemies  think  that 
they  have  triumphed,  and  that  they  have  succeeded  in 
besmirching  the  great  name  of  the  Great  Frenchman, 
they  have  done  nothing  of  the  sort.  I  have  shown  you 
some  of  the  letters  that  we  have  received  ;  I  have 
hundreds  more  upstairs  from  all  parts  of  France  and 
from  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men.  The  belief  in  de 
Lesseps  is  as  strong  as  ever ;  it  is  only  that  his  enemies 
are  noisier  now  than  they  have  been  for  some  time.  A 
man  like  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps  is  not  to  be  besmirched. 
There  are  certain  people  who  are  above  the  attacks  of 
the  mob." 

I  wrote  that  night  to  London  about  the  prosecution, 
and  I  said  that  the  evil  things  that  were  being  said  about 
Ferdinand  de  Lesseps  were  too  despicable  for  comment. 
Indeed,  I  think  that  his  beautiful  and  courageous  wife,  in 
the  words  that  I  have  quoted  above,  and  his  friends  in 
the  letters  that  I  had  read,  made  all  the  comment  that 
was  required  on  the  actions  of  those  who  put  on  an  old 


THE    REWARD   OF    DE    LESSEPS       145 

man  of  eighty-six,  who  had  given  milHons  in  the  past, 
and  a  source  of  millions  for  the  future  to  his  country, 
and  who  was  then  poorer  himself  than  he  had  been 
twenty  years  previously,  the  affront  of  a  summons  into 
a  public  court  of  justice.  What  would  have  been  one's 
indignation  if  one  had  known  how  mercilessly  the  poor 
old  man  was  to  be  hounded  into  imbecility  and  death, 
while  the  thieves  and  extortioners  were  allowed  to  enjoy 
their  gains  in  peace  and  quiet  ? 


10 


CHAPTER  X 

After  the  Dt'hdclc—K  Visit  to  La  Chesnaye— A  House  of  Mourning — How 
De  Lesseps  and  his  Family  were  beloved — The  Lesseps  Children  and 
their  Stepbrother  Charles — Ferdinand  de  Lesseps  portrayed — Renan's 
Tribute — Friends  in  Adversity — The  Family  at  Luncheon — De  Lesseps' 
Hope  in  Queen  Victoria — My  Last  View  of  the  Great  Frenchman. 

SOME  months  later — in  the  spring  of  1892 — I  paid 
another  visit  to  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps.  In  the 
following  pages  I  give  the  account  of  this  visit,  which 
I  wrote  at  the  time.  I  was  not  to  see  the  old  man 
again. 

Seated  in  an  arm-chair,  now  feebly  turning  over  the 
leaves  of  his  Souvenii's  of  Forty  Years,  now  letting  his 
dimmed  eyes  wander  listlessly  over  the  broad  expanse 
of  fields  and  woodlands  outside  the  windows,  Ferdinand 
de  Lesseps,  the  great  Frenchman,  drags  out  the  agony 
of  his  old  age. 

The    visitor   to    him    in    his    retreat   arrives    at    La 

Chesnaye  to  some  extent  attuned  to  melancholy,  for  the 

long   diligence    ride    from    the    nearest    railway    station, 

twenty-four  kilometres  away,  is  across  a  most  desolate 

country.     This  part   of  the  ancient   Duchy  of  Berry  is 

one  of  the  districts  in  France  which  has   most  suffered 

by  the  ruin  of  the  vine  culture  :  the  lands  seem  deserted 

and  abandoned,  the  roads  are  neglected,  and  little   life 

is   seen   anywhere   till    the   sleepy   burgh   of   Vatan    is 

146 


A   VISIT   TO    LA   CHESNAYE  147 

reached.  From  Vatan,  which  is  a  market  town  on  the 
old  and  now  disused  high  road  from  Paris  to  Toulouse, 
to  the  chateau  of  La  Chesnaye,  there  are  four  more 
kilometres  of  road  across  an  equally  desolate  country 
to  be  taken.  The  buildings  of  the  home  farm  are  the 
first  human  habitations  that  one  sees  all  the  long  way. 
An  oppressive  sense  of  desolation  imposes  itself  on  even 
the  casual  wayfarer,  and  prepares  for  the  sorrowful  sight 
that  awaits  him  who  goes  to  La  Chesnaye  to  salute 
the  fallen  greatness  of  the  old  man  who  but  two  years 
ago  was  the  greatest  Frenchman  in  France. 

The  chateau  of  La  Chesnaye,  a  modest  country 
house  of  irregular  shape,  and  flanked  at  the  angles 
with  towers,  has  been  in  the  possession  of  M.  de 
Lesseps  for  fifty  years.  Except  for  a  large  modern 
wing,  it  stands  just  as  Agnes  Sorel,  its  first  occupant, 
left  it.  In  her  days  it  had  served  as  a  hunting-box 
for  her  royal  patron  and  the  Berry  squires,  and  at 
present  is  still  surrounded  with  fields  scantily  timbered. 
There  is  no  well-kept  lawn,  but  the  fields  of  grass  are 
full  of  violets,  and  there  is  a  trim  look  about  the  stables. 
On  a  bright  day  the  white  of  the  stone,  contrasted  with 
the  green  of  the  grass,  gives  a  cheerful  look  to  the 
scene,  but  it  is  indescribably  mournful  of  aspect  in 
the  days  of  rain  and  snow  and  wind.  About  half  a 
mile  on  the  road,  before  the  chateau  is  in  sight,  an 
avenue  of  trees  is  reached. 

"  Those  trees  were  planted  by  M.  de  Lesseps  him- 
self forty  years  ago,  and  every  time  that  he  passes  this 
way  he  relates  the  fact." 

So  spoke  to  me  the  English  governess  of  the  de 
Lesseps  children,  whom  Madame  de  Lesseps  had 
despatched  to  meet  me  with  the  pony  carriage  at 
Vatan. 


I4S  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

"  The  Countess  is  terribly  busy  to-day  with  her 
papers,  for  she  is  expecting  a  barrister  from  Paris,  who 
is  to  receive  some  instructions  in  view  of  the  new  trial  ; 
but  she  will  nianaoe  to  give  you  an  hour,  and  wants 
you  to  drive  to  church  with  her,  so  that  you  can  talk 
on  the  way." 

As  we  entered  the  courtyard  the  Countess's  carriage 
was  in  waiting  at  the  front  entrance.  It  was  the  landau 
of  the  days  of  triumphant  drives  in  the  Champs  Elys(^es, 
and  the  horses  were  the  same  pair  which  excited  the 
admiration  and  envy  of  the  connoisseurs  of  the  Avenue 
des  Acacias,  "Juliette"  and  "Panama,"  which  latter 
is  now  never  called  by  that  name.  It  is  talked  about 
as  "  the  other,"  for  the  ill-fated  word  Panama  is  never 
even  whispered,  lest  any  echo  of  it  should  reach  the 
ears  of  him  to  whom  this  word  has  meant  ruin  and 
disgrace  and  a  broken  heart. 

I  waited  for  the  Countess  at  the  bottom  of  the  spiral 
staircase,  and  presently  saw  a  lady  descending,  who 
greeted  me  in  a  familiar  voice,  but  whom  I  failed  to 
recognise. 

"  But,  yes,"  she  said,  holding  out  her  hand,  "  I  am 
Madame  de  Lesseps.      I  have  changed,  have  I  not  ? " 

When  I  last  met  Madame  de  Lesseps  in  Paris, 
though  at  that  time  the  shadow  of  the  present  was 
already  upon  her,  she  was  in  the  full  of  her  matronly 
beauty,  large,  ample,  and  flourishing.  It  was  a  wasted 
woman  who  addressed  me,  pinched  and  thin. 

"If  I  were  to  remove  my  veil,"  she  added,  "you 
would  see  an  even  greater  change.  It  is  a  sad  moment 
that  you  have  chosen  to  visit  us,  and  you  find  us  in 
terrible  circumstances,"  she  said  as  we  drove  away. 
Then,  turning  to  the  lady  who  accompanied  her,  she 
remarked:  "  This  is  the  first  time  I   have  been  out  for 


A    HOUSE    OF    MOURNING  149 

three  weeks,  and  I  ought  not  to  have  gone  out  to-day, 
except  for  the  fact  that  I  can't  miss  going  to  church 
again.  It  is  the  only  comfort  I  have  left  to  me.  All 
my  days,  and  most  of  my  nights,  when  not  attending 
on  my  husband,  are  taken  up  answering  letters  and 
telegrams  which  keep  pouring  in  upon  me  from  all  parts 
of  the  world.  And  then  I  am  in  constant  correspondence 
with  the  lawyers  in  Paris  as  to  the  prosecution  of  my 
son  for  corruption  and  the  revision  of  the  last  judgment 
of  the  Court  of  Appeal." 

The  church  which  is  attended  by  the  La  Chesnaye 
party  is  situated  in  a  village  about  three  miles  off^  which 
is  called  Guilly,  "  the  mistletoe  hamlet,"  as  all  the  trees 
around  are  covered  with  this  parasite. 

We  were  passing  a  fine  old  oak,  the  upper  part  of 
which  was  loaded  with  mistletoe,  when  the  lady  who 
was  with  us  laughed  scornfully,  and,  pointing,  said  : 
"One  would  say  Herz,  Arton,  and  the  rest,"  referring 
to  the  Panama  parasites. 

"  Would  you  believe  me,"  said  Madame  de  Lesseps, 
"  that  until  these  recent  revelations  I  had  never  even 
heard  the  names  of  either  Arton  or  Herz  or  the  Baron 
de  Reinach  ? " 

Outside  the  church  was  standing  a  char-a-banc  drawn 
by  two  horses,  and  it  was  in  this  that,  after  service, 
I  returned  to  La  Chesnaye  with  the  children  and  the 
governess.  It  was  interesting  to  see  how  devoted  the 
people  of  Guilly  seem  to  be  to  the  de  Lesseps  family, 
and  how  the  men  and  women  bowed  and  courtesied 
as  the  Countess  came  out  of  church.  Here,  as  at 
Vatan  and  in  allthe  district,  the  love  and  respect  for 
"  Monsieur  le  Comte "  have  been  increased  rather 
than  diminished  by  the  persecutions  to  which  he  has 
been  subjected.     It  was  on  the  great  fair-day  at  Vatan 


150  TWEN  IV    \1<:.\I^S    IN    IWRIS 

that  the  news  o\  liis  coiulemnation  was  iiiaJe  public, 
and  at  once  the  villaoers,  in  sign  of  mournin<^,  stopped 
the  piiliHc  ball,  which  is  a  /c^/e  to  which  the  young 
peoj^le  of  the  district  look  forward  for  months  beforehand. 

Sturdy  Berrichon  lads  have  been  seen  to  flourish 
their  sticks  and  heard  to  say  that  the  Parisians  had 
better  keep  their  hands  off  "  Monsieur  le  Comte." 
Nor  is  it  surprising  that  in  his  own  country  M.  de 
Lesseps  should  be  loved  and  venerated.  Always  de- 
lighting in  acts  of  kindness,  his  generosity  towards  his 
poor  neighbours  throughout  the  district  has  been  con- 
stant and  large-handed.  Never  a  marriage  takes  place 
in  any  of  the  surrounding  villages  but  that  a  handsome 
present  from  La  Chesnaye  is  thrown  into  the  bride's 
coi'beille.  The  children  are  dressed  for  confirmation  at 
the  expense  of  the  chateau,  layettes  are  found  for  poor 
mothers,  and  no  case  of  distress  is  allowed  to  pass 
unrelieved.  Since  the  heavy  losses  which  the  Panama 
failure  has  entailed  on  the  family,  no  change  nor 
diminution  in  these  liberalities  has  been  made. 

But  perhaps  what  the  people  in  the  district  like 
the  best  in  the  La  Chesnaye  folk  is  their  extreme 
simplicity.  Chateau  folk  are  not  generally  very  popular 
in  France,  and  certainly  not  in  republican  circumscrip- 
tions, because  republican  electors  of  the  peasant  class 
have  inherited  prejudices  about  them  ;  and  if  the 
de  Lesseps  family  are  so  very  popular,  it  is  because  of 
the  extreme  simplicity  of  their  manners  and  of  the  way 
in  which  they  live  the  lives  of  the  people  around  them. 
For  instance,  not  the  children  alone,  but  even  the 
elegant  Madame  de  Lesseps  herself,  are  dressed  in 
clothes  purchased  and  made  in  Vatan.  Nothing  is  got 
from  Paris,  and  the  Vatan  people  are  highly  pleased 
with  the  unusual  compliment  thus  paid  to  them. 


THE    DE    LESSEES   CHILDREN         151 

By  the  church  at  Guilly  is  an  orphanage,  which 
was  founded  by  the  de  Lesseps  and  is  entirely  kept 
up  at  their  expense.  It  is  a  rule  with  Madame 
de  Lesseps  to  pay  a  visit  to  this  orphanage  each  Sunday 
after  mass,  and,  accordingly,  as  she  left  the  church  she 
asked  me  to  return  home  with  the  children.  Of  these 
there  are  now  seven  at  home,  Matthew,  who  has  just 
returned  on  sick  leave  from  the  Soudan,  being  in  Paris 
near  his  stepbrother  Charles.  Ismail  is  serving  in  the 
army  as  a  soldier  in  a  regiment  of  chasseurs  at  St. 
Germain  ;  and  the  eldest  daughter,  the  Comtesse  de 
Gontaut-Biron,  is  in  Nice,  whither  she  has  been  sent 
by  her  doctors.  Lolo,  aged  eighteen,  is  the  eldest  girl 
at  home ;  and  Paul,  a  handsome  lad  of  twelve,  with 
long  ringlets  down  his  back,  is  the  eldest  boy.  The 
youngest  children  are  mere  babies.  There  is  Zi-Zi, 
a  tiny  little  boy,  with  fair  curls  and  dark  eyes  ;  and 
Griselle,  a  charming  little  mite,  who  on  that  Sunday 
was  dressed  in  a  Kate  Greenaway  bonnet  and  gown, 
and  looked  sweetly  pretty. 

The  char-a-banc,  spacious  as  it  was,  was  quite  filled. 
Besides  all  the  children,  from  Lolo  down  to  Zi-Zi, 
there  were  the  English  and  German  governesses,  Paul 
and  Robert's  tutor,  the  niece  of  Madame  de  Lesseps, 
who  for  many  years  past  has  lived  with  the  family, 
and   an  intimate  friend,   Mademoiselle  Mimaut. 

It  was  a  merry  party,  and  yet,  whenever  the  name 
of  the  poor  old  father  at  home  was  mentioned,  silence 
came  over  the  prattle  of  the  children.  "They  all  feel 
it  deeply,"  said  Madame  de  Lesseps  to  me  later  on, 
"though  their  youth  often  gets  the  better  of  their 
feelings.  And  what  grieves  them  most  is,  to  know 
that  their  brother  Charles,  whom  they  all  love  and  respect 
like  a  second  father,  is   in  prison,   whilst  they  can  run 


152  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

about.  Zi-Zi  and  Griscllc  write  to  him  every  day  at 
Mazas  or  the  Conciergerie,  and  send  him  violets  and 
little  stories  which  they  compose  for  his  amusement, 
spending  long  hours  inking  their  fingers  over  their 
paper." 

About  halfway  home  the  carriage  passed  the  rural 
postman,  trudging  along  on  his  daily  thirty-mile  round. 
The  children  would  have  the  carriage  stopped,  and, 
though  it  was  quite  full,  place  was  made  for  him. 
Father  Pierre  seemed  quite  a  favourite  with  the 
children,  for  is  it  not  he,  as  little  Griselle  said,  who 
brings  letters  from  brother  Charles  ?  Charles,  it  seems, 
writes  every  day,  and  his  letters,  to  judge  by  what 
every  member  of  the  family  told  me,  are  admirable  in 
their  manly  unselfishness.  There  is  never  a  word  of 
complaint  about  the  wretchedness  of  his  position  ;  his 
only  anxiety  is  about  his  father,  and  he  is  ready  to 
undergo  everything  so  that  the  old  man  may  be  spared 
a  moment's  pain.  Ruined,  disgraced,  though  not  dis- 
honoured, having  to  face  a  long  period  of  imprisonment, 
which  at  his  age  and  in  his  physical  condition  may  kill 
him,  he  affects  in  his  letters  the  greatest  cheerfulness. 

Nor  is  his  heroic  unselfishness  without  its  reward. 
He  is  the  idol  of  everybody  at  La  Chesnaye  and  for 
miles  around.  Only  one  complaint  has  escaped  him 
since  his  confinement,  and  that  was  when,  during  his 
hurried  visit,  under  guard,  to  his  father,  he  went  with  the 
children  for  a  favourite  walk  to  a  neighbouring  wood. 
Here,  as  he  was  walking-  alonor  the  avenue  which  runs 
through  some  magnificent  timber,  he  looked  around  at 
the  detectives  behind  him,  and  said  with  a  sigh,  "  And 
to-morrow  I  shall  be  again  within  four  grey  walls  !  "  But 
immediately  he  added  that  if  he  could  only  be  allowed 
to  come  and  pass  an   afternoon  in  the  wood  with  his 


AFTER   THE    "DEBACLE"  153 

brothers  and  sisters  every  month,  he  would  not  mind  his 
confinement  in  the  least,  and  would  resign  himself  to  the 
prospect  of  imprisonment  for  the  rest  of  his  days.  Yet 
he  is  past  fifty-three,  and  his  health  has  suffered  terribly 
from  what  he  has  undergone. 

The  half  hour  before  lunch  was  spent  by  the  children 
in  showing  their  pets,  A  prime  favourite  with  them 
just  now  is  a  little  Newfoundland  puppy,  which  has 
quite  dethroned  in  their  affections  an  old  shepherd 
dog,  who,  as  Zi-Zi  relates,  "came  one  day  and  liked 
us  so  much  that  she  has  never  left  us."  Another  pet 
of  whom  a  great  deal  is  made  is  an  African  monkey 
which  Matthew  brought  home  from  the  Soudan.  It  is 
called  Bou-Bou,  and  when  it  is  scolded  it  hides  its  face 
in  its  hands.  It  is  quite  tame,  and  runs  free,  without 
a  chain. 

Just  before  lunch  the  children  set  about  picking 
violets,  each  a  bunch.  This  they  do  every  day.  One 
is  for  Charles  at  Mazas,  another  for  Madame  de  Lesseps, 
but  the  sweetest  is  for  the  old  father  to  wear  in  his 
buttonhole  at  lunch,  which  is  the  only  meal  he  takes 
with  the  family.  The  child  whose  bouquet  is  worn  by 
the  father  is  the  proudest  child  in  Berry  that  day. 

I  could  not  refrain  from  a  movement  of  the  most 
painful  surprise  when,  after  a  few  moments  spent  in  the 
drawing-room,  I  was  invited  by  Madame  de  Lesseps  into 
the  room  where  her  husband  sat.  I  have  known  M.  de 
Lesseps  for  many  years,  and  though  the  last  time  that 
I  saw  him  he  was  already  under  the  influence  of  the 
sorrow  of  defeat — it  was  just  after  he  had  been  called 
before  a  magistrate  for  examination — my  recollection  of 
him  had  always  been  as  of  a  man  of  most  surprising 
vitality  and  highest  spirits — keen,  bright,  energetic  ;  defy- 
ing the  wear  of  time  ;  a  man  of  eternal  youth  in  spite  of 


154  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

his  white  hairs.  I  rcnuinlHTcd  liiin  last  erect,  with  clear 
voice  and  tlashini^  eyes,  and  now  I  saw  him  huddled 
to<]^ether  in  a  chair,  a  wrap  about  his  knees,  nodding 
his  head  as  under  sleep  ;  pale,  inert,  and  with  all  the 
life  gone  out  of  his  eyes.  Behind  him  was  a  large 
screen  tapestried  with  red  stuff,  against  which  the  waxen 
whiteness  of  his  face  and  hands  stood  out  in  strong 
relief. 

How  old  he  looked,  whom  age  had  seemed  to  spare 
so  long !  For  the  most  part  the  head  drooped  forward 
on  his  chest ;  but  now  and  then  he  raised  it  listlessly  and 
let  his  eyes  wander  round  the  room  or  across  the  panes 
on  to  the  fields  beyond.  There  was  rarely  recognition 
in  his  glance  ;  mostly  a  look  of  unalterable  sadness — of 
w'onder,  it  may  be,  at  the  terrible  hazards  of  life.  Yet 
when  now  and  then  one  of  the  children,  who  were 
crowding  about  his  chair,  pressed  his  hand  or  kissed 
his  cheek  or  said  some  words  of  endearment  to  him,  the 
smile  which  was  one  of  his  characteristics  came  over  his 
face,  and  for  a  brief  moment  he  seemed  himself  again. 
Himself  again,  that  is  to  say,  in  the  goodness  and 
great-heartedness  which  more  than  all  he  has  ever  done 
for  France  merited  for  him  the  name  of  "  the  Great 
Frenchman."  For  greatness  of  heart  has  always  been 
the  keynote  of  the  character  of  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps. 
It  was  the  secret  of  the  indescribable  seduction  which 
he  e.xercised  over  every  one  who  came  near  him,  from 
emperor  to  labourer.  It  was  to  this  quality  of  his  that 
M.  Renan,  albeit  a  sceptic  himself,  rendered  such  signal 
homage  in  the  speech  in  which  he  welcomed  M.  de 
Lesseps  to  the  French  Academy  on  the  day  of  his 
admittance. 

"  You  were  good  to  all  who  came,"  said  M.  Renan. 
"  You  made  them  feel  that  their  past  would  be  effaced 


ERNEST    KENAN'S   TRIBUTE  155 

and  that  a  new  life  lay  before  them.  In  exchange  you 
only  asked  them  to  share  your  enthusiasm  in  the  work 
which  you  had  devoted  to  the  interest  of  France.  You 
held  that  most  people  can  amend,  if  only  one  will  forget 
their  past.  One  day  a  whole  gang  of  convicts  arrived 
at  Panama  and  took  work  at  the  canal.  The  Austrian 
consul  demanded  that  they  should  be  handed  over  to 
him  ;  but  you  delayed  giving  satisfaction  to  his  request, 
and  at  the  end  of  some  weeks  the  Austrian  consulate 
was  fully  occupied  in  remitting  home  to  Austria^ — to 
their  families,  or,  it  may  be,  to  their  victims — the  moneys 
which  these  outcasts,  whom  you  had  transformed  into 
honest  workmen,  were  earning  with  the  work  of  their 
hands. 

"You  have  declared  your  faith  in  humanity.  You 
have  convinced  yourself,  and  tried  to  convince  others, 
that  men  are  loyal  and  good  if  only  they  have  the 
wherewithal  to  live.  It  is  your  opinion  that  it  is  only 
hunger  that  makes  men  bad.  '  Never,'  said  you  in  one  of 
your  speeches,  *  have  I  had  cause  for  complaint  against 
any  of  the  workmen,  although  I  have  employed  outcasts, 
pariahs,  and  convicts.  Work  has  redeemed  even  the 
most  dishonest.  I  have  never  been  robbed,  not  even 
of  a  handkerchief  It  is  a  fact  which  I  have  proved, 
that  men  can  be  brought  to  do  anything  by  showing 
them  kindness  and  by  persuading  them  that  they  are 
working  in  a  cause  of  universal  interest.'  Thus  you 
have  made  green  again  what  seemed  withered  for  ever 
and  aye.  You  have  given,  in  a  century  of  unbelief,  a 
startling  proof  of  the  efficacy  of  faith." 

In  view  of  the  awful  change  that,  within  so  short  a 
time,  has  been  made  in  this  gentleman,  I  cannot  but 
think  that  it  must  be  attributed  to  the  shock  produced 
in  a  very  old  man  by  an  experience  which  shows   him 


156  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

that  he  has  been  mistaken  all  his  lift'  long.  It  is  terrible 
to  wake  up  at  eighty-five  and  find  that  things  are  not 
what  one  has  believed  during  his  past  life,  and  that  the 
men  whom  one  has  loved  and  respected  are  unworthy. 
I  believe  that  what  has  struck  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps 
down  in  his  chair  in  full  vitality  is  an  immense  disap- 
pointment, not  at  the  failure  of  his  hopes — for  he  has 
always  been  indifferent  to  money,  and  has  never  had 
the  wish  to  leave  his  children  large  fortunes — but  at  the 
falseness  of  a  creed  which  was  optimistic  to  the  point 
of  blindness, 

I  believe  that  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps  is  dying  of  a 
broken  heart,  broken  by  the  immense  ingratitude  of 
men.  And  if  the  loss  of  all  the  money  that  has  been 
sunk  in  the  Panama  mud  and  the  pockets  of  the  intri- 
gants of  the  Third  Republic  adds  to  his  sorrow,  it  is 
certainly  not  for  himself  nor  his  family,  but  for  all  those 
who  are  suffering  because  they  shared  his  belief  in  his 
star,  and  who  blindly  followed  him  to  ruin.  He  knew 
that  they  were  of  the  humble,  and  often  told  me  so. 
"  Panama  will  be  carried  out  with  the  savings  in  woollen 
stockings  of  the  peasant  and  of  the  workman,"  he  used 
to  say. 

He  has  never  been  self-seeking.  He  presented 
France  with  a  concession,  that  of  the  Suez  Canal, 
estimated  at  one  hundred  millions  of  francs,  and  with 
lands  worth  another  thirty  millions,  and  fought  heroically 
for  years  to  render  to  his  gift  its  greatest  value.  In 
the  words  of  M.  Renan,  the  courage,  the  energy,  the 
resources  of  all  sorts  expended  by  M.  de  Lesseps  in 
this  struggle  were  nothing  short  of  prodigious.  In  ex- 
change he  took  for  himself  enough  to  enable  him  to 
lead  the  life  of  a  gentleman  and  to  do  good  around  him. 
Each  of  his  children   he  endowed  with  not  more  than 


DE    LESSEES'    NOBLE    CHARACTER     157 

seventy  thousand  francs,  the  revenues  from  which,  to- 
gether with  his  wife's  private  fortune,  are  now  all  that 
remain  to  the  family. 

I  firmly  believe  that  all  his  life  he  acted  only  from 
feelings  of  philanthropy  and  from  patriotism  of  the 
most  chivalrous  type.  He  never  had  any  desire  to  leave 
a  large  fortune,  and  I  can  remember  his  saying  to  me 
very  emphatically  that  his  children  must  do  as  he  had 
done,  and  that  they  would  do  so  if  they  were  worthy  of 
his  name  ;  that  he  had  never  wished  to  leave  them  large 
fortunes,  but  an  honourable  name,  a  love  for  their  country 
equal  to  his,  and  an  example  which  he  hoped  they  would 
follow.  "  Let  them  work  as  I  have  done,"  said  this 
most  tender  of  fathers. 

It  seems  that  not  even  this  heritage  of  an  honoured 
name  is,  if  the  persecutors  of  the  old  man  can  have  their 
way,  to  be  left  to  his  family.  Since  he  has  been  down, 
the  number  of  his  adversaries  has,  of  course,  increased 
tenfold.  Even  those  who  owe  him  all — many  officials 
at  the  Suez  Canal  Company,  for  instance,  who  owe  their 
positions  and  fortunes  to  his  genius — seem  glad  to 
revenge  themselves  for  their  obligation.  De  Lesseps 
has  done  too  much  good  to  men  not  to  be  hated,  and 
it  Is  to  be  regretted  that  poor  de  Maupassant  cannot 
wield  his  pen  in  analysis  of  the  motives  which  are 
actuating  his  former  dependants  in  their  endeavours  to 
renounce  all  solidarity  with  the  dying  octogenarian  of 
La  Chesnaye. 

I  visited  the  offices  of  the  Suez  Canal  Company  a 
few  days  ago,  and,  prepared  as  one  is  for  human  in- 
gratitude, it  was  distressing  in  the  extreme  to  see  how 
poor  a  thing  to  charm  with  was  the  name  at  the  sound 
of  which,  as  I  can  well  remember,  all  the  flunkeys  of  the 
place,  in  livery  or  black  frock-coat,  doubled  up   in   the 


158  TWI-NTV    YEARS    IN    PARIS 

days  that  arc   past.      The  Hon  is  down,  and  every  ass  of 
Paris  has  a  heel  to  kick  him  with. 

On  the  other  hand,  the  adversities  of  the  de  Lesseps 
family  have  revealed  to  them  the  immense  number  of 
friends  which  they  possess  in  all  parts  of  the  world. 
Letters  and  telegrams  keep  pouring  in  from  all  sides 
to  La  Chesnaye,  and  all  the  available  pens  are  kept  busy 
most  of  the  day  and  night  in  answering  the  kindest 
expressions  of  sympathy,  many  from  utter  strangers. 
"  This  is  the  only  thing  that  gives  me  courage  to  bear 
it  all,"  said  Madame  de  Lesseps.  Helene  told  me,  with 
some  amusement,  that  a  Spanish  banker  had  the  day 
before  written  to  Madame  de  Lesseps  to  offer  her  a 
present  of  a  million,  and  that  there  had  been  many 
similar  offers  of  pecuniary  assistance  from  people  who 
believed  the  family  to  be  totally  ruined.  When  Charles 
was  down  at  La  Chesnaye,  and  was  walking  in  the 
woods  with  his  escort  behind  him,  a  serious  proposal 
was  made  to  him  by  friends  who  had  gathered  around 
him  to  effect  his  rescue,  if  he  would  but  give  the  word. 

As  for  tokens  of  sympathy  from  all  the  country 
round,  they  are  unending.  The  farmer  at  the  home 
farm,  which  was  built  by  M.  de  Lesseps,  and  which 
has  been  in  the  occupation  of  the  present  tenants  from 
the  beginning,  was  at  dinner  when  the  paper  containing 
the  news  of  Charles's  conviction  and  sentence  reached 
him.  "  He  turned  quite  white,"  said  his  wife  to  me, 
"  and  rushed  out  of  the  house,  and  went  roaming  about 
the  woods  like  a  demented  man  until  late  at  night. 
And  I  have  cried  every  time  I  have  thought  of  M. 
Charles,  whom  I  knew  when  he  was  a  baby  not  higher 
than  my  knee." 

But  perhaps  the  most  devoted  friend  that  remains 
to  the   family   is   M.   de   Lesseps'  valet,   who   since    his 


FRIENDS    IN   ADVERSITY  159 

master's  fall  has  never  left  him  for  more  than  ten  minutes 
together,  sleeping  on  a  mattress  in  his  bedroom,  and 
waiting  on  him  patiently  all  day  and  all  night.  "  Don't 
let  any  one,  I  don't  care  who  it  may  be,"  he  says, 
clenching  his  fist,  "  come  near  my  master.  I  will  be 
killed  before  any  offence  shall  be  put  upon  him."  And 
though  one  is  rather  sceptical  as  to  such  professions, 
I  fully  believe  that  in  this  case  they  are  sincere.  It  was 
touching  to  note  with  what  reverence,  when  lunch  was 
served,  this  valet  approached  his  master,  and,  mindful 
of  old  formalities  of  respect,  bowed  and  said  that 
Monsieur  the  Count  was  served ;  to  note  with  what 
womanly  gentleness  this  strong  man  lifted  his  feeble 
master  up,  and  guided  his  tottering  steps  into  the 
adjoining  dining-room. 

What  a  beautiful  family  it  was,  to  be  sure,  that 
gathered  round  that  table  ! — Paul,  with  his  girlish  ringlets  ; 
Robert,  also  in  curls  ;  Helene,  who  sat  next  to  her 
father,  with  her  jet-black  hair  loose  down  her  back, 
and  her  bright  eyes  contrasting  with  the  ivory  pallor 
of  her  face,  worn  out  as  the  poor  child  is  with  care  and 
sorrow  and  hard  work  as  her  mother's  penwoman. 
Then  there  was  Lolo,  a  young  lady  of  eighteen,  roughly 
dressed,  but  of  great  elegance,  who  looked  even  sadder 
than  the  rest,  but  who  tried  to  be  bright  and  gay ;  and 
on  the  other  side  of  her  Solange,  who,  though  she  is 
quite  a  woman  in  appearance,  hates  to  be  considered 
so,  wants  to  be  treated  as  a  child,  refuses  to  wear 
long  dresses,  and  loves  to  climb  trees  in  the  park 
and  to  give  picnics  to  her  little  brothers  and  sisters  in  a 
mud  hovel  which  she  has  constructed  in  the  garden. 
Then  there  are  Zi-Zi  and  Griselle — more  than  twenty  in 
all  around  the  long  oval  table.  Every  now  and  then 
one  of  the  children  rises  from  its  seat  and  runs  up  to 


i6o  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

the  old  father  and  kisses  him  on  the  cheek  or  presses 
his  hand  ;  and  I  iliink  all  envied  Helene,  who  sat 
next  to  him,  and  could  caress  him  when  she  liked.  I 
was  seated  just  opposite  the  old  man,  and  I  am  afraid 
my  presence  disturbed  him,  for  he  seemed  to  listen  to 
what  I  said,  and  to  wonder  who  I  was  and  what  I 
might  want. 

I  shall  never  forget  the  sight  of  him  as  he  faced  me, 
sunk  down  in  his  chair,  with  one  trembling  hand  holding 
his  napkin  to  his  breast,  and  feebly  with  the  other 
guiding  the  morsels  to  his  mouth.  He  seemed  to  eat 
with  some  appetite,  though  under  persistent  drowsiness, 
which  was  only  shaken  off  for  a  moment  when  his  wife, 
who  came  in  late,  took  her  seat  at  the  table.  Then  his 
head  was  lifted,  and  a  bright  look  came  into  his  eyes, 
as  if  of  salute  to  the  comrade  of  his  life.  Whatever 
Madame  de  Lesseps  may  have  suffered,  I  am  sure  that 
she  feels  herself  repaid  each  time  that  those  eyes  are 
so  lifted  to  hers. 

The  ddjeiiner  was  a  simple  though  ample  one,  the 
menu  being  in  keeping  with  the  manner  of  life  at 
Chesnaye,  which  is  that  of  comfort  without  ostentation. 
The  wine  is  grown  by  Madame  de  Lesseps  herself,  on 
vineyards  of  her  own  planting,  and  is  that  "  grey  wine  " 
which  is  so  much  appreciated  by  connoisseurs.  It  has  a 
beautiful  colour  in  a  cut-glass  decanter. 

The  conversation  was  a  halting  one.  Each  tried  to 
be  gay,  each  tried  to  forget  the  deep  shadow  that  lay 
over  that  family  gathering.  When  the  old  man's  eyes 
wandered  around  the  table  as  if  in  quest  of  some  one 
whom  he  desired,  but  who  was  not  there,  a  silence 
imposed  itself  on  all,  for  all  knew  whom  he  was  seeking 
and  where  that  dear  one  was.  In  his  buttonhole  was 
H^lene's   bouquet  of  violets,  underneath  which  peeped 


HOPE    IN   QUEEN    VICTORIA  i6i 

out  the  rosette  of  the  Grand  Officer  of  the   Legion  of 
Honour — alas,  in  jeopardy  ! 

We  took  coffee  in  the  drawing-room.  It  was  served 
on  a  table  which  stood  underneath  a  fine  portrait  of 
Agnes  Sorel,  once  the  mistress  of  the- house.  Facing 
us  were  two  pictures  of  the  inauguration  of  the  Suez 
Canal.  The  furniture  was  covered  with  tapestries, 
mostly  from  the  needle  of  the  Countess. 

It  was  here  that  Madame  de  Lesseps  told  me  of  the 
old  man's  present  life.  "He  has  the  fixed  idea  that 
the  Queen  of  England  will  come  and  make  all  things 
right.  He  often  rises  in  his  chair  and  asks  if  Queen 
Victoria  has  arrived,  and  when  any  visitor  comes  he 
thinks  it  is  she  at  last." 

Then  blanching,  the  Countess  added,  "You  think, 
sir,  do  you  not,  that  he  is  in  ignorance  of  what  has 
happened  ?  You  do  not  think  that  he  has  any  suspicion  ? 
Sometimes  the  dreadful  thought  troubles  me  that  he 
knows  all,  and  that,  great-hearted  gentleman  that  he  is, 
he  lends  himself  to  this  most  tragic  comedy  that  we 
are  playing.  I  sometimes  doubt.  Would  not  that  be 
terrible  ?  And  again  there  are  times  when  I  am  con- 
vinced that  our  efforts  to  hide  all  that  is  are  successful. 
We  give  him  last  year's  papers  to  read.  I  have  had 
collections  sent  down.  Formerly  we  used  to  cut  out 
or  erase  parts  which  we  did  not  want  him  to  see,  but 
he  seemed  to  notice  the  alterations,  and  so  we  ordered 
down  papers  of  a  year  ago.  And  it  is  quite  pathetic  to 
hear  the  remarks  he  occasionally  makes.  Thus  a  few 
days  ago  he  called  me  to  his  side  in  high  glee,  and  said 
how  happy  he  was  to  hear  that  his  old  friend  M.  Ressman 
had  been  appointed  Italian  Ambassador  to  France,  an 
event  of  more  than  a  year  ago.  There  are  times,  too, 
when  he  gets  very  impatient  at  being  kept  down  here, 

II 


i62  TWEN'IV    YEARS    IN    PARIS 

and  what  he  misses  chiefly  is  the  French  Academy. 
He  is  constantly  telling  me  how  anxious  he  is  to  attend, 
and  I  have  ti)  invent  the  sorriest  fables  to  explain  to 
him  that  the  Academicians  are  not  holding  any  meetings, 
as,  for  instance,  that  they'are  all  old  men,  and  that  they 
are  taking  a  long  hoHday." 

The  Countess  sighed,  and  said,  "  I  do  what  I  can, 
but  that  terrible  doubt  pursues  me  often.  You  see,  he 
did  know  that  the  Panama  affair  had  resulted  in  ruin. 
It  is  since  he  was  called  before  that  examining  magis- 
trate, M.  Prinet,  that  he  has  been  as  you  have  seen 
him.  He  must  suspect  something.  How  much  w^e  shall 
never  know." 

Then  she  added,  "  He  is  constantly  asking  after 
Charles.  He  knows  that  he  is  in  trouble,  but  we  hope 
that  he  does  not  suspect  what  the  trouble  is.  Before  he 
was  taken  as  he  is,  Charles  had,  to  his  knowledge, 
become  involved  in  that  Societe  des  Comptes  Courants 
bankruptcy,  which  ruined  him,  and  perhaps  his  father 
thinks  that  his  son's  troubles  are  in  connection  with  that 
affair." 

Then  the  stepmother  broke  out  into  impassioned 
praise  of  the  stepson  :  "  The  noblest  heart !  He  will 
suffer  all,  rather  than  let  the  slightest  harm  come  to  his 
father.  He  is  a  hero,  a  gentleman! — a  hero,  a  hero! 
When  he  was  here  he  told  us  what  he  had  undergone, 
and  said  that  he  was  willing  to  undergo  ten  times  as 
much,  so  that  his  father  be  left  unmolested, 

"  It  is  strangers  who  send  us  expressions  of  their 
sympathy.  Those  whom  de  Lesseps  has  enriched  have 
forgotten  him.  And  yet  I  am  unjust.  I  have  had  letters 
from  people  who  risked  their  positions,  their  daily  bread, 
in  writing  to  me  as  they  did.  But  not  a  single  political 
man  has  written  a  word  to  express  condolence  with  the 


A   LAST   VIEW   OF    DE    LESSEPS       163 

great  patriot  or  with  his  family.  They  dare  not.  None 
of  my  letters  are  safe.  Many  of  my  friends  have  re- 
ceived my  letters  open.  Many  letters  addressed  to  me 
have  gone  astray.  It  is  dangerous  to-day  to  be  the 
friend  of  the  man  who  gave  a  fortune   to  his  country. 

"He  sits  there  all  day,"  she  continued,  "and  reads 
his  Souvenirs  of  Forty  Years,  the  souvenirs  which  he 
has  dedicated  to  his  children.  And  at  times  he  is  quite 
his  old  self  again  ;  but  drowsiness  is  always  coming  upon 
him.  Mon  Dieu  !  that  he  may  be  spared  to  us  a  little 
longer ! " 

Helene  just  then  passed  through  the  room.  "  There 
is  a  paper  in  papa's  room,"  she  whispered,  "  which  I 
must  take  away.     There  is  the  word  Panama  upon  it." 

Our  conversation  was  held  with  bated  breath,  and 
the  ill-fated  word  was  scouted  like  an  unclean  thing. 

And  whilst  we  were  talking,  the  sunny,  curly-headed 
Paul  ran  into  the  room  and  cried  out,  "Oh,  do  come 
and  see  papa  !  Bou-Bou  has  jumped  on  to  his  shoulder 
and  is  picking  his  violets." 

We  moved  towards  the  door,  and  this  was  the  last 
that  I  saw,  or  may  ever  see,  of  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps.^ 
Against  the  red  background  of  the  two-fold  screen  he 
sat,  sunken  asleep  in  his  arm-chair,  with  the  two  volumes 

^  I  was  never  to  see  him  again.  He  died  about  eighteen  months 
later,  with  the  resignation  of  a  Christian  martyr.  As  he  lay  on  his 
death-bed,  so  I  have  been  told,  he  looked  like  a  young  man  again,  with 
all  the  care  and  trouble  wiped  away  from  his  noble  face. 

Since  then  the  children  whom  I  had  known  as  little  ones  have  all 
grown  up.  Seven  of  them  are  married  and  have  children  of  their  own. 
Madame  de  Lesseps  has  now  ten  grandchildren.  The  youngest  daughter, 
who  was  a  baby  in  a  pinafore  when  I  visited  La  Chesnaye,  has  recently 
become  engaged  to  be  married.  One  could  wish  for  no  better  memorial 
to  the  Great  Frenchman  than  this  large  descendance,  by  whom  his 
name  will  be  handed  down  to  the  generations  yet  to  come  with  the 
love  and  veneration  which  it  so  well  deserves. 


i64  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

that  tell  the  story  of  liis  heroism  in  his  lap,  and  on  his 
shoulders  perched  a  grinning  Barbary  ape,  pulling  at 
and  munching  the  violets  which  Helene  had  picked  for 
him,  and  which  hid  in  his  buttonhole  his  jeopardised 
rosette  of  the  Legion  of  Honour.  Around  him  stood 
his  children,  and  it  was  sad  to  see,  and  sadder  still  to 
think,  that,  his  family  excepted,  what  holds  this  great 
heart  and  splendid  gentleman  in  dearest  affection  is 
not  the  millionaire  grown  rich  on  his  achievements,  but 
a  witless,  speechless  thing,  that  perhaps  has  feeling 
what  a  great  and  generous  heart  is  here. 


CHAPTER  XI 

Mon  sieur  Eiffel — Meetings  with  him  in  Elevated  Spheres — His  Visit  to 
England  —  "A  Magnificent  Experience  "  —  A  Tribute  to  English 
Railways — The  Firth  of  Forth  Bridge — The  Prince  and  the  Engineer — 
The  Eloquence  of  the  Weather — "  The  Ascertained  Average  " — "  Per 
;^4o,ooo  Life"— "The  Most  Remarkable  Construction,  bar  none" — 
Edison  and  Eiffel — Eiffel's  Modesty. 

IT  was  Monsieur  de  Lesseps  who  introduced  me  to 
Eiffel,  and  I  saw  a  good  deal  of  that  famous 
engineer.  A  great  many  people  who  lost  their  money 
in  the  Panama  Canal  Scheme  have  very  bitter  things  to 
say  about  him  ;  even  his  complete  downfall  and  disgrace 
have  not  satisfied  their  rancours  ;  they  are  pleased  that 
with  his  own  hands  he  raised  to  himself,  so  hiofh  that  all 
the  world  may  see  it,  a  memorial  tower  which  none  looks 
at  without  remembering  a  certain  verdict  and  a  certain 
judgment. 

For  my  part  I  can  only  say  that  Monsieur  Eiffel 
always  impressed  me  as  being  a  straightforward,  plain- 
spoken  business  man,  as  full  of  energy  as  he  seemed 
devoid  of  cunning.  I  cannot  now  believe  that  there 
was  duplicity  in  his  conduct  towards  Lesseps.  I  always 
knew  him  as  a  rich  man,  who  could  command  any  capital 
that  he  needed  for  any  enterprise,  and  who  had  far  more 
work  brought  to  his  office  than  he  could  possibly  attend 
to.  I  have  been  in  his  company  on  many  occasions,  and 
I  liked  him  better  each  time  I  saw  him.  I  had  a  very 
sincere  admiration   for  his  quiet,   determined    air.      He 

165 


i66  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

was  the  ideal  type  of  tlie  engineer,  I  never  yet  saw 
a  I'Venchman  who  resembled  him.  It  is  true  that  his 
enemies  say  tliat  he  had   no   Erench  blood   in  him. 

We  met  in  society  ;  we  met  in  the  not  less  exalted 
sphere  of  his  office  at  the  very  top  of  the  tower,  just 
under  the  lightning  conductor,  where  one  afternoon 
he  entertained  me,  and  gave  me  full  technical  details 
about  this  colossal  undertaking.  I  also  frequently 
saw  him  in  his  office  in  town,  which  was  close  to 
the  expiatory  chapel  of  Louis  XVI.,  in  a  quiet 
street  of  that  quiet  quarter.  His  business  premises 
occupied  a  whole  house,  which  was  home-like  and 
English  in  its  exterior  appearance,  and,  like  the  man 
himself,  quiet,  reserved,  and  modest.  On  the  door  was 
a  small  brass  plate  with  Eiffel's  name  upon  it.  The 
interior  was  luxuriously  furnished ;  one  was  impressed 
with  the  fact  that  this  was  the  abode  of  a  successful  and 
prospering  man.  The  entrance  hall  was  thickly  carpeted, 
and  was  gay  with  flowers  and  palms.  The  waiting-room 
was  a  very  salon,  most  sumptuously  furnished,  the  walls 
being  hung  with  plans  and  designs  of  gigantic  enter- 
prises, accomplished  or  under  consideration.  Footmen 
in  livery  were  in  attendance.  An  adjoining  room  was 
Eiffel's  private  office.  It  was  soberly  but  richly  fur- 
nished, and  was  similarly  decorated  with  pictures  of  his 
triumphs  over  iron  and  steel,  Eiffel's  table  was  at  the 
far  end  of  this  room,  a  plain  working-table.  His  son-in- 
law  sat  opposite  to  him.  Between  them  on  the  wall  were 
all  kinds  of  electrical  apparatus  for  killing  space  and  time 

I  remember  calling  on  him  here  one  day  shortly 
after  his  visit  to  England,  whither  he  had  gone,  in 
company  with  other  distinguished  Frenchmen,  to  be 
present  at  the  inauguration  of  the  Firth  of  Forth  Bridge. 
We   had    on   that    occasion  a  long  conversation   about 


A   TRIBUTE    TO   ENGLISH    RAILWAYS     167 

this     structure    and    about    English .  railways,    in    the 
course  of  which  the  famous  engineer  paid  a  very  high 
tribute    to    our  country.      He  spoke  of  his   visit   as    "  a 
magnificent    experience,"  and   he  said,   "  What    perhaps 
struck  me  most  during  my  journey  in   England  was  the 
admirable    arrangements    which    regulate    your    railway 
traffic,  the  special  conditions  of  comfort  that  are  to  be 
found   in   railway-travelling  in  England,  the  rapidity  of 
the  trains,  the  easiness  of  the  motion,  the  perfect  disci- 
pline of  the    men,  and   the   absolute    regularity  of  the 
service    throughout.       In    all     these    respects     English 
railway-travelling  compares   most   favourably   with   that 
in  any  other  country  that  I  know.      I   include  France  in 
the  comparison.    The  speed  of  your  trains  is  remarkable. 
I  am  sure  that  on  my  way  to  Scotland  the  average  speed 
at  which  we  travelled  was  forty-five  kilometres,  while  at 
certain  periods   during  the  run  it  must  have  exceeded 
one  hundred  kilometres  an  hour.     Well,  even  when  we 
were  travelling  at  the  highest  rate  of  speed  the  motion 
was  one  of  delicious  ease.     There  was  no  straining,  no 
jolting,  no  sickening   swaying   from  side  to  side.     We 
ran  as  a  sledge  runs  over  level  ice.     Your  railway  men 
have  suppressed  the  fatigue  of  railway  travelling,  and  I 
was  particularly  grateful  for  the  fact,  for  I  was  very  tired 
when  I  set  out  for  Scotland,  having  been  hurried  from 
the  banquet-hall  into  the  train,     fen  Mais  ravi.     As  an 
engineer    I    was   struck   with    the   absolute   regularity   of 
the  onward  movement  of  the  train,  its  perfect  uniformity, 
showing  the   excellent  construction   of  your   iron  roads. 
When  a  railway  is  badly  constructed  the  traveller  feels 
the  changes  in  speed,   now  slow,   now  fast,  and   a  very 
uncomfortable    feeling   it   is.      On   the   English   railways 
that  sensation  is  never  experienced ! " 

The   other  day,   when   I    was   travelling   in    Poland, 


i68  TWRXTY   YKARS    IN    PARIS 

EificTs  words  c;iinc  I)ack  to  mc  at  c;ach  nauseating  roll 
and  lurch  of  the  train.  One  must  go  abroad  to  appreciate 
the  good  things  that  are  in  England. 

EitVcl  was  very  enthusiastic  about  the  Forth  Bridge. 
He  said,  "  I  was  very  much  struck  by  it.  J'en  dtais 
iout-a-fait  frappcK  And  I  may  say  the  same  of  all  my 
French  colleagues.  I  consider  that  its  construction  in 
no  single  point  leaves  anything  to  be  desired.  It  is  a 
piece  of  work  which  does  the  greatest  possible  honour 
to  English  engineering,  even  without  taking  the  special 
difficulties  which  stood  in  the  way  of  the  engineers  into 
consideration.  These  were  colossal.  The  high  winds 
that  sweep  down  the  Firth  at  all  times,  the  terrible 
agitation  of  the  waters,  the  enormous  distance  from 
pillar  to  pillar. 

"The  weather  which  we  had  on  the  day  of  inauguration 
opened  our  eyes  to  what  your  engineers  had  had  to 
contend  with.  His  Royal  Highness  said  to  me,  while 
we  were  on  the  bridge :  '  I  am  sorry,  Monsieur  Eiffel, 
that  we  can't  offer  you  better  weather  for  your  visit.' 
I  answered,  '  Your  Highness  will  allow  me  to  differ. 
The  weather  could  not  be  better  for  us.  It  shows  us 
what  difficulties  were  put  in  the  way  of  the  men  who 
built  this  bridge.' 

"  And,  indeed,  the  howling  of  the  winds  and  the 
hissing  of  the  waters  below  were  eloquent  in  the  extreme 
of  the  skill  and  resolution  of  these  men.  Each  hat  that 
was  blown  away  off  some  visitor's  head  was  a  bravo  in 
their  honour.  And,  apropos  of  the  dangers  and  difficulties 
of  the  enterprise,  there  is  another  thing  connected  with 
this  construction  that  shows  how  thoroughly  competent 
were  the  engineers  :  the  number  of  workmen  who  were 
killed  during  the  carrying  out  of  the  work  was  much 
below  the  ascertained  average." 


"THE   ASCERTAINED   AVERAGE"      169 

I  confess  that  I  felt  a  shiver  running  over  me  as 
Eiffel  said  these  words  in  his  cold,  matter-of-fact  way. 
I  gasped  out,  "  The  ascertained  average  ?  "  "  Yes,  it 
has  been  ascertained  by  statistical  observation  that  in 
engineering  enterprises,  one  man  is  killed  for  every 
million  francs  that  is  spent  on  the  work.  Thus,  sup- 
posing you  have  to  build  a  bridge  at  an  expense  of  one 
hundred  million  francs,  you  must  be  prepared  for  the 
death  of  one  hundred  men.  In  building  the  Eiffel 
Tower,  which  was  a  construction  costing  six  million  and 
a  half,  we  only  lost  four  men,  thus  remaining  below  the 
average.  In  the  construction  of  the  Forth  Bridge,  fifty- 
five  men  were  lost  over  forty-five  million  francs'  worth  of 
work.  Here  the  average  is  much  exceeded  ;  but  when 
the  special  risks  are  remembered,  this  number  shows  as 
a  very  small  one,  and  reflects  very  great  credit  on  the 
engineers  for  the  precautions  which  they  took  on  behalf 
of  their  men." 

Some  days  later  I  met  Eiffel  at  a  dinner-party,  and 
once  more  heard  him  talking  of  his  visit.  He  was 
asked  what  had  been  his  first  impression  of  the  bridge 
when  it  came  in  view.  He  said  :  "  I  had  studied  the 
plans  and  pictures  of  the  bridge  before  I  saw  it,  and 
so  went  prepared  for  a  grand  sight.  But  what  I  had 
imagined  was  nothing  compared  to  the  reality.  My  first 
impression  was  one  of  amazement.     It  was  grandiose." 

A  gentleman  said :  "  What  place  would  you  give  to 
the  Firth  of  Forth  Bridge  among  the  great  constructions 
of  the  world  ?  " 

Eiffel  answered  in  a  very  decisive  tone :  **  The  first 
absolutely ;  the  first,  bar  none.  It  is,  I  consider,  the 
most  remarkable  construction  that  the  world  can  boast 
of,  and  the  most  beautiful  piece  of  work  in  metal  that 
exists,  not  excepting  our  tower,  from  which,  as  Fowler 


I70  TWENTY   VF.ARS    I\    PARIS 

was  good  enough  to  say,  some  of  the  inspiration  which 
guided  the  engineers  was  drawn.  I  take  into  con- 
sideration the  importance  of  the  construction  and  the 
difficulties  that  stood  in  its  way.  The  excessive  length, 
for  instance,  that  intervenes  between  the  several  pillars. 
It  is  this,  indeed,  which  is  the  most  remarkable  feature 
in  the  construction.  There  is  nothing  like  it  anywhere 
else.  Owing  to  the  extreme  depth  of  the  water,  the 
number  of  pillars  had  to  be  a  very  small  one,  and  conse- 
quently the  span  of  each  of  the  arches  had  to  be  very 
large,  larger  than  in  any  railway  bridge  that  has  ever 
yet  been  constructed.  Certainly  there  are  longer  bridges 
in  the  world,  but  the  merit  of  this  construction  lies  in 
the  very  great  difficulties  attaching  to  it," 

He  was  asked  his  opinion  on  the  cantilever  system, 
which  since  those  days  has  been  largely  introduced  into 
bridge-building  in  France.  He  said  :  "  I  have  never 
made  use  of  it  myself  in  any  of  my  constructions  ;  and, 
indeed,  there  is  only  one  bridge  in  France  where  it  was 
used,  and  that  is  the  "V^iaur  Viaduct,  It  is  a  beautiful 
system.  The  bridge  grows  out  and  out  without  scaffold- 
ings, each  fresh  part  forming  the  scaffolding  for  the  part 
that  is  to  come  next," 

A  lady  wanted  to  know  what  faults  Monsieur  Eiffel 
had  to  find  with  the  Forth  Bridge,  Had  his  eye  noticed 
any  defect  which  might  some  day  account  for  a  terrible 
tragedy?  He  answered  in  his  familiar  decisiveness  of 
tone :  "  None  at  all.  I  can  predict  no  tragedies,  I 
have  no  fault  of  any  kind  to  find  with  it.  I  am  con- 
vinced that  it  will  fulfil  its  purpose  in  every  way." 

"But  I  have  been  told,"  said  the  lady,  "that  it  is 
the  climax  of  what  is  ugly," 

"Is  what  is  useful  ever  ugly.'*"  answered  Monsieur 
Eiffel. 


EIFFEL'S   MODESTY  171 

That  evening  he  said  to  me  :  "  I  can  hardly  express 
how  greatly  I  was  gratified  at  the  most  cordial  and 
kind  reception  that  your  compatriots  gave  me  during 
my  visit  to  England.  It  was  touching  in  the  extreme, 
and  gave  me  more  pleasure  than  anything  that  I  can 
remember  in  the  course  of  my  career.  The  Prince  was 
kindness  itself;  and  then  there  were  Mr.  Fairbairn,  of 
the  Great  Northern,  and  Sir  Lowthian  Bell,  and  Mr. 
Forbes,  who  were  all  most  amiable.  I  was  quite  sur- 
prised to  find,"  he  added,  "  how  popular  I  was  in 
England.  I  had  no  idea  of  anything  of  the  sort. 
Everybody  seemed  to  take  such  an  interest  in  my 
personality  that  I  felt  quite  confused  at  times.  Then 
there  were  photographers  who  wanted  to  take  my 
photograph,  and  numbers  of  people  wrote  to  me  for 
my  autograph,  just  as  if  I   were  a  celebrity." 

I  looked  hard  at  Eiffel  as  he  spoke  these  words,  for 
I  could  hardly  believe  that  he  was  speaking  seriously. 
But  no  twinkle  came  into  his  eyes ;  his  manner  was 
perfectly  natural.  Those  words  were  typical  of  the  man, 
and  I  often  think  of  them,  and  regret  that  a  man  of 
such  great  achievements  and  such  noble  simplicity  should 
have  come  to  disaster. 

An  Englishman  who  was  at  the  dinner  asked  Eiffel 
what  nation  took  the  most  interest  in  his  tower.  He 
said  that  the  three  nations  who  showed  themselves  most 
impressed  by  that  construction  were  the  Americans  first, 
then  the  Russians,  and  next  the  English.  He  added 
that,  unfortunately.  Sir  Edward  Watkin  had  been  ill 
when  he  was  in  London,  for  he  had  much  wanted  to 
talk  to  him  about  his  projected  tower,  which  was  to 
be  fifty  metres  higher  than  his  own.  He  said  that  he 
was  much  interested  in  it,  although  he  did  not  see  that 
England  had  any  reason  to  desire  to  cap  his  work  in 


172  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Paris,  for  the  Forth  Bridge  did  that.  No  doubt  since 
those  words  were  spoken  a  good  many  people  have 
regretted  that  Eifiel  did  not  meet  Sir  Edward  Watkin, 
and  possibly  dissuade  him  from  embarking  on  his  ill- 
fated  scheme. 

Apropos  of  his  remark  that  the  Americans  showed 
great  interest  in  the  Eiffel  Tower,  I  was  able  to  tell 
Monsieur  Eiffel  how  delighted  Edison  had  been  with 
that  construction.  "I  am  glad  to  hear  it,"  he  said; 
"  for  when  Edison  lunched  with  me  in  my  room  at 
the  top — you  remember,  the  place  where  we  took  an 
apc'ritif  together — he  hardly  spoke,  and  I  must  say  I 
should  have  liked  to  hear  his  opinion." 

"  Edison  is  not  a  maker  of  phrases,"  I  said.  *'  I 
lunched  with  him  on  the  tower,  chez  Brdbant.  We 
naturally  talked  of  it.  Somebody  said  :  '  'Tis  the  work 
of  a  bridge-builder,'  with  something  of  a  sneer  in  his 
voice.  '  No,'  said  Edison  decisively — '  no ;  it  is  a 
great  idea.  The  glory  of  Eiffel  is  in  the  magnitude  of 
the  conception  and  the  nerve  in  the  execution.  That 
admitted,  and  the  money  found,  the  rest  is,  if  you  like, 
mere  bridge-building.  I  like  the  French,'  he  added  ; 
'  they  have  big  conceptions.  The  English  ought  to 
take  a  leaf  out  of  their  book.  What  Englishman  would 
have  had  this  idea  ?  What  Englishman  could  have 
conceived  the  Statue  of  Liberty?'" 

"  If  Monsieur  Edison  had  said  that  to  me,"  answered 
Eiffel,  "  I  should  respectfully  have  pointed  out  to  him 
that  the  Forth  Bridge  is  a  much  greater  conception,  and 
that  it  needed  very  much  more  nerve  in  its  execution 
than  my  tower.  But,  all  the  same,  I  am  much  pleased  to 
hear  that  Edison  thought  so  highly  of  my  experiment." 

"  Yes,"  I  said ;  "  but  he  added  that  New  York  was 
going  to  build  a  tower  of  two  thousand  feet  in  height. 


EDISON  AND   EIFFEL  173 

'We'll  go  Eiftel  lOO  per  cent,  better,'  he  said,  'without 
discount.'  " 

"Eh,  bien!"  said  Eiffel  very  quietly,  "  nous  verrons 
cela." 

And,  as  with  some  other  announcements  that  the 
Americans  have  made,  we  are  still  waiting  to  see. 

It  is  a  curious  psychological  fact  that  whenever  the 
name  of  Eiffel  occurs  to  me,  the  first  thing  of  many 
things  that  he  told  me  which  comes  into  my  mind  is  that 
cold-blooded  statistical  average  which  engineers  have 
established  for  computing,  besides  the  cost  of  an  under- 
taking, the  amount  of  workmen's  lives  which  will  be 
sacrificed,  and,  further,  the  number  of  widows  and  father- 
less children  that  will  be  created.  It  is  necessary, 
indispensable,  no  doubt ;  but  the  absolute  certitude 
that  any  undertaking  which  progress  or  speculation  may 
dictate  must  be  cemented  with  so  much  human  blood 
impresses  me  always  as  a  very  mournful  circumstance. 
And  when  I  read  of  wretched  criminals  who  have  killed 
men  and  women  for  the  sake  of  some  paltry  plunder, 
my  indignation  against  them  knows  no  bounds.  Joseph 
Aubert,  for  instance,  who  slew  a  man  to  rob  him  of 
about  eight  pounds  :  just  the  five-thousandth  part  of  the 
market  price  of  a  man's  life,  according  to  engineering 
statistics.  He  merited  all  his  punishment.  One  does 
not  so  outrageously  cut  the  established  rates. 


CHAPTER  XII 

Thomas  Alva  Edison — How  I  made  his  Acquaintance — A  Characteristic 
Letter — The  King's  Envoye — Count  and  Countess  Edison — Edison's 
Opinion  on  Paris — A  Dt'jeuner  on  the  Eiffel  Tower — The  Simplicity 
of  a  Great  Man — Edison  on  Electrocution — "  What  is  Electricity, 
after  all?" — Edison  and  Mr.  Gladstone  —  His  Opinion  on  Eiffel, 
President  Carnot,  and  Prime  Minister  Tirard. 

AMONGST  my  most  pleasant  recollections  of  the 
Paris  Exhibition  of  1889  are  the  hours  which  I 
spent  in  the  company  of  that  great,  simple  man, 
Thomas  Alva  Edison.  If  he  had  never  invented  any- 
thing, if  his  nemie  were  not  synonymous  with  some 
of  the  most  marvellous  inventions  of  human  genius, 
if  his  life-story  did  not  exemplify  to  what  heights  of 
wealth  and  influence  the  poorest  lad  may  raise  himself 
by  means  of  certain  gifts,  and  more  particularly  by 
means  of  certain  qualities,  such  as  pluck,  perseverance, 
and  total  abnegation  of  self,  he  would  still  be  the  most 
delightful  companion  that  a  man  could  wish  to  meet. 
He  is  a  big  boy,  full  of  fun  and  humour,  simple,  un- 
affected, and  kind-hearted.  He  has  the  secret  of 
perennial  youth ;  for  though  his  hair  is  grey,  there  is 
not  a  wrinkle  on  his  forehead.  It  can  do  no  one  any- 
thing but  much  good  to  be  in  Edison's  society.  I  know 
that  often  when  I  have  risen,  depressed  and  dead  in 
heart  and  hope,  from  reading  the  elegies  of  some  modern 
Schopenhauer,    I    have   thought,   "  Oh,    why   is   Orange 

174 


EDISON'S    PARIS    MAILBAG  175 

so  many  thousand  miles  of  land  and  water  away  from 
here,  and  why  can't  I  go  to  Edison  and  get  him  to  tell 
me  that  life  is  a  fine  thing  ?  " 

When  in  the  early  part  of  August  of  that  year  I 
heard  that  Edison  had  arrived  with  his  bride  at  the 
Hotel  du  Rhin,  I  determined  that  I  must  make  his 
acquaintance  ;  and  as  I  did  not  want  to  wait  till  I  could 
get  a  letter  of  introduction  to  him,  I  wrote  to  him  and 
asked  him  to  let  me  come  and  see  him.  He  was  being 
inundated  with  letters  at  the  time.  As  he  told  me  after- 
wards, "  An  unpleasant  recollection  of  Paris,  when  I 
ofet  back  home,  will  be  that  of  the  enormous  number  of 
cranks  and  crooks  that  there  are  here.  You  would  be 
surprised  to  read  some  of  the  letters  which  I  receive 
daily  by  the  hundreds.  I  have  given  up  looking  at  them 
at  all.  Some  of  these  letters  contained  the  strangest 
offers  that  you  could  imagine.  Many  were  from  in- 
ventors, who  begged  me  to  come  to  their  places  to  give 
the  last  touches  to  some  lunatical  invention  of  theirs. 
There  was  one  man  who  wrote  several  times.  He 
had  invented  an  electrical  toothbrush  or  some  such 
nonsense.  But  the  bulk  of  them  wanted  assistance 
in  another  way.  I  have  had  hundreds  of  applications 
for  loans  from  people  of  every  description.  The  low 
flattery  displayed  in  these  letters  is  enough  to  sicken 
a  man.  It  would  have  required  an  enormous  fortune 
to  meet  all  these  demands.  There  was  one  young 
fellow  who  wanted  me  to  allow  him  an  income  while 
he  finished  his  studies.  He  hoped  to  get  through  with 
them  in  about  ten  years,  at  the  end  of  which  time  he 
would  be  in  a  position  to  place  a  really  valuable  col- 
laborator at  my  disposal." 

The  letter,   however,   in   which,   like    Mr.    Toots,    I 
asked  him  for  the  pleasure  of  his  acquaintance,  brought 


170  TWENTY  YEARS   IN    PARIS 

nic  an   immediate  and   most  characteristic  reply,   which 
is  reproduced  on  opposite  page. 

"  H6tel  du  Rhin, 
••4.P''"  Vend6me. 

"  Friend  Sherard, — 

"All  right.  Friday  about  11  in  mng. 
I'll  be  sane  by  that  time.  My  intellect  is  now  making 
275  revolutions  a  minute. 

"  Yours,  Edison." 

The  Edisons  occupied  the  grand  first  floor  of  the 
fashionable  hotel,  and  in  more  ways  than  one  the  simple 
inventor  and  man  of  genius  looked  out  of  place  in  the 
vulgar  surroundings  of  wealth.  Of  course,  one  knew 
that  the  shabbily  dressed,  ascetic-looking  man  could,  if 
he  chose,  write  out  a  cheque  which  would  have  repre- 
sented the  value  of  the  house  from  ground  to  attic,  with 
all  that  it  contained,  twenty  times  over,  and  the  beautiful 
young  bride  had  all  the  elegance  of  the  wife  of  an 
American  millionaire.  But  somehow  one  did  not 
"  place  "  Thomas  Alva  Edison  amongst  gilded  furniture, 
with  velvet  curtains  about  him  and  lace  hangings.  He 
is  the  sort  of  man  that  one  likes  to  see  with  a  pen,  or, 
better,  with  a  pair  of  pliers  in  his  hands  and  his  shirt- 
sleeves tucked  up.  When  I  was  ushered  into  the  room 
I  saw  the  master  standing  by  the  mantelpiece  listening  to 
an  excitable  little  man  who  was  dressed  in  the  height  of 
fashion  and  who  was  waving  a  box  in  his  hand  which 
looked  like  a  jewel-case.  He  was  speaking,  so  I  heard, 
"  in  the  name  of  humanity."  He  was  addressing  the 
"  King  of  Science,"  and  he  was  most  verbose  and  gesti- 
culative.  I  liked  Edison  the  man  before  I  had 
exchanged  a  single  word  with  him,  for  his  delightful 
attitude  face  to  face  with  the  bore.  His  face  wore  the 
sweetest  and  kindest  of  smiles,  and  he  was  apparently 


HOTEL  Du  F^HIN 

4,P"  Vendome 


Jji  ifew  cLy\^^er\  cA/».^ 


IS 


irS  TWENTY  YEARS    IX    PARIS 

giving  his  entire  attention  to  the  man.  I  heard  after- 
wards, however,  that  at  such  times,  a  certain  deafness 
aiding,  he  is  able  to  tix  his  thoughts  elsewhere.  Yet 
that  certain  ezarcment  of  which  de  la  Rochefoucauld 
speaks  is  never  to  be  noticed  in  his  eyes. 

Colonel  Gouraud.  who  at  that  time  was  Edison's 
London  representative,  and  who  was  present  amongst 
other  people  in  the  drawing-room  of  the  Hotel  du  Rhin, 
drew  me  aside  and  said,  "  I  may  tell  you  something 
which  Mr.  Edison  would  never  tell  you.  That  gentleman 
who  is  talking  to  him  is  the  Cavaliere  Copello.  He  has 
just  come  to  Paris  on  a  special  mission  trom  the  King  of 
Italv  to  Mr.  Edison,  bringing  him  the  insignia  of  Grand 
Omcer  of  the  Crown  of  Italy." 

"  Sav.  Gouraud."  cried  Edison,  "let  me  see  the  letter 
that  came  along  of  the  insignia."  It  was  delightful  to 
hear  how  he  pronounced  the  last  word.  The  tone  was 
one  of  amused  tolerance. 

The  Minister's  letter  was  as  follows  : 
'■  The  presentation  by  Cavaliere  Copello  to  the  King, 
my  august  Sovereign,  of  the  phonograph  invented  by 
your  Signaria,  produced  the  deepest  impression  on  the 
mind  of  His  Majesrv",  who  has  recorded  on  the  machine 
itself  his  greatest  admiration.  The  King,  in  consequence, 
wishing;  to  give  vou  a  well-merited  testimonial  of  honour 
for  the  great  scientific  discoveries  which  are  associated 
with  your  name,  so  universally  known,  has  been  pleased, 
of  his  own  accord,  to  confer  upon  you  the  rank  of  Grand 
Officer  of  the  Crown  of  Italy.  I  am  happy  to  present  to 
you  herewith,  on  behalf  of  His  Majesty,  the  insignia  of 
this  high  honour,  and  reserve  to  myself  to  send  you  as 
soon  as  possible  the  Royal  letters  patent  of  the  same.  In 
the  meanwhile  deign  to  accept,  etc. 

'•  Rattazzi." 


COUNT   AND   COUNTESS    EDISON      179 

"  This  order  confers  upon  you,  sir,  the  title  of  count," 
said  the  Cavaliere  Copello,  "  and  on  you.  madame,"  he 
added,  turning  and  bowing  to  Mrs.  Edison,  "  the  title  of 
countess." 

I  wished  that  a  few  representatives  of  European 
flunkeydom  could  have  seen  Edison's  face  when  this 
announcement  was  made  to  him  b}'^  the  little  Cavaliere. 
He  actually  laughed,  much  to  Signor  Copello's  astonish- 
ment, and  not  a  Httle  to  his  confusion.  A  few  minutes 
later  I  was  able  to  get  into  conversation  with  him.  I 
said  :  •  I  suppose,  Mr.  Edison,  I  must  ask  you  what  vou 
think  of  Paris  ?  " 

He  said  :  "  Oh,  I  am  dazed  I  My  head's  all  in  a 
muddle,  and  I  reckon  it  will  take  me  at  least  a  year  to 
reco\er  my  senses.  I  wish  now  that  I  had  come  over 
in  my  laboratory-  blouse,  and  could  have  gone  about 
unknown  and  have  seen  something.  The  Exhibition  is 
immense,  larger  than  our  Philadelphian  Exhibition.  So 
far,,  however,  I  have  set-  very^  httle  of  it.  Still,  this 
morning  I  saw  a  tool  which  will  save  me  six  thousand 
dollars  a  year.  It  is  a  chisel  worked  by  hydraulic  pressure. 
I  just  saw  it  as  I  was  passing  by — iust  a  glance.  I  shall 
order  some  and  send  them  out ;  they  will  enable  us  to 
reduce  our  labour  by  eighteen  hands. 

"  What  has  struck  me  so  far  chiefly,"  he  ccritinued. 
"  is  the  absolute  laziness  of  the  people  over  here.  When 
do  these  people  work  ?  What  do  they  work  at  ?  I  have 
not  seen  a  cartload  of  goods  in  the  strer:s  s'r.ce  I  came 
to  Paris.  People  here  seem  to  have  r?:  blished  an 
elaborate  system  of  loafing.  These  er^:.-:s  who  come 
to  see  me.  fashionably  dressed,  with  walking-sticks  in 
their  hands,  when  do  they  do  their  work  ?  I  can't 
understand  it  at  all." 

I  said  :  '•  We  know  you  are  terrible  for  work  yourself. 


iSo  TWI'NTV   YFARS    IN    PARIS 

We  hear  wonderful  stories  over  here.  You  have  the 
reputation  of  beine^  able  to  work  for  twenty-three  hours 
.1  day  lor  an  indefinite  period." 

"Oh!"  said  Edison,  smiling,  "I  have  done  more 
than  that,  haven't  I,  Gouraud  ?  As  a  rule,  though,  I  get 
through  twenty  hours  a  day.  I  find  four  hours'  sleep  quite 
sufficient  for  all  purposes." 

At  that  time  Edison  was  perfecting  the  phonograph, 
and  I  think  that  he  entertained  hopes  of  its  usefulness 
which  have  not  since  been  realised.  I  remember  his  saying 
to  me  :  "  We  have  got  the  phonograph  into  practical  form. 
Already  eighteen  hundred  machines  are  in  use  in  com- 
mercial houses,  and  our  factories  are  now  turning  out 
forty  complete  machines  per  diem.  I  have  also  at  last 
been  able  to  make  a  perfectly  solid  mailable  cylinder, 
which  can  go  through  the  post  for  any  distance  without 
any  risk  of  damage.  All  this  has  been  very  hard  work. 
On  the  tools  for  making  the  phonograph  alone  we  spent 
five  thousand  dollars.  I  have  also  created  a  small  model 
— a  pocket  phonograph,  if  you  like  to  call  it  so — the 
cylinder  of  which  will  register  three  hundred  words,  the 
length  of  an  ordinary  letter,  which  will  be  very  practical 
for  ordinary  correspondence.  The  phonograph  is  being 
used  in  the  newspaper  offices,  too.  It  is  being  used  in 
the  JVezu  York  World  office.  The  machine  is  placed 
downstairs  ;  the  reporters  come  in  and  talk  to  it  ;  then 
the  cylinder  is  sent  upstairs  to  the  composing-rooms,  and 
the  compositors  set  up  from  its  dictation.  They  attain 
much  greater  speed,  make  more  '  ems  '  an  hour,  than  with 
the  old  system,  and  earn  more  money." 

I  believe  that  since  those  days  the  phonograph  has  not 
been  found  practical  for  work  of  this  kind,  and  that  most 
literary  men  have  been  forced  to  abandon  it.  Robert 
Barr  at  one  time  used  one  in  the  Idler  office,  and  Guy 


EDISON   AND   THE    REPORTERS       i8i 

Boothby  was  reported  to  dictate  all  his  novels  into  a 
phonograph  receiver.  But  amongst  the  presidents  of 
the  Republic  of  Letters  the  custom  never  obtained.  The 
literature  so  produced  was  redolent  of  the  contrivance, 

I  asked  Edison  about  his  well-known  kindness  for 
newspaper  men.  He  said  :  "  I  think  the  New  York 
reporters  are  the  smartest  set  of  men  in  creation,  and  I 
am  fond  of  them.  Almost  every  Sunday  I  have  a  party 
of  them  down  at  my  place,  and  some  of  them  spend  all 
the  day  with  me.  I  take  in  two  New  York  papers,  and 
read  every  word  of  them." 

I  may  remark  that  Edison's  kindness  to  newspaper 
men  is  so  well  known  in  New  York  that  whenever  a 
reporter  who  is  attached  to  a  paper  on  lineage  or  space 
rates  is  desperately  hard  up  for  copy,  he  goes  as  a  rule  to 
Edison,  who  is  always  ready  to  welcome  him  and  to  talk 
over  what  he  is  doing,  and  so  help  the  journalist  to  write 
a  column  for  his  paper.  This  explains  why  one  is  con- 
stantly reading  in  the  papers  that  Edison  is  going  to  do 
this  or  that  wonderful  thing.  Some  of  the  "  boys  "  have 
been  to  Orange  to  see  "  old  man  Edison,"  have  had  a 
talk  with  him,  and  on  their  return  to  their  offices  have 
written  out  an  imaginative  account  of  the  great  scientist's 
projects,  well  knowing  that,  whatever  absurdities  they 
may  put  into  his  mouth,  Edison  is  much  too  kind-hearted 
a  man  to  contradict  them.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  and  such 
was  my  experience  of  him,  Edison  does  not  like  to  give 
information  about  ideas.  It  is  at  such  times  that  his  fits 
of  deafness  come  over  him,  and  he  will  deplore  his  im- 
possibility to  continue  the  conversation.  In  him  every- 
thing is  so  practical  that  it  seems  he  cannot  talk  about 
what  is  phantom  merely.  It  is  the  "what  is"  that 
interests  him,  and  not  the  "  what  is  to  be." 

I  think  it  would  be  well  if  this  were  generally  known, 


iS2  TWKXrV   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

because  Edison's  reputation  has  somewhat  suffered  over 
in  Europe  by  the  periodical  publication  in  the  papers  of 
alleged  boasts  which  he  has  made  of  wonderful  things 
that  he  is  going  to  do.  The  man  is  the  least  self- 
advertising  of  scientists  ;  he  has  never  boasted  of  any- 
thing in  his  life,  and  if  he  does  not  contradict  the 
predictions  which  are  attributed  to  him,  it  is  because  he 
does  not  want  to  get  some  poor  newspaper  man  into 
trouble.  During  the  course  of  that  morning  I  asked  him 
about  different  projects  which  had  been  attributed  to  him, 
notably  about  the  far-seeing  machine,  and  of  this  he  said  : 
"  I  have  heard  that  some  European  inventors  claim  to 
have  preceded  me  in  this,  but  I  do  not  know  anything 
about  their  inventions.  My  own  machine  is  getting  on 
very  nicely."  Then  he  added  very  modestly  :  "  I  don't 
think  that  it  will  ever  be  useful  for  long  distances,  and  it 
is  absurd  to  say  that  it  will  enable  one  to  see  things  ten 
thousand  miles  away.  In  a  city,  however,  it  will  be  of 
practical  use.  I  don't  look  for  anything  further — at  least 
at  present." 

The  only  time  when  I  heard  him  predict  was  with  refer- 
ence to  his  famous  ore-extracting  machine,  but  that  was  in 
one  sense  ay^zV  accompli.  He  said  :  "  It  is  going  to  be  a 
great  thing.  Already  we  have  eighty  machines  at  work 
in  the  iron  mines.  It  is,  however,  only  as  yet  adapted 
for  iron  ore.  I  am  studying  the  question  of  a  machine 
for  treating  refractory  silver  ore  and  gold  ore,  and  shall 
get  them  out  by-and-by.  Then  we  shall  make  more 
money." 

Edison  talks  of  money  with  the  respect  of  a  man  who 
recognises  its  potency  as  a  factor  in  social  and  industrial 
dynamics.  Personally  he  cares  nothing  for  money  ;  per- 
sonally he  has  no  use  for  it  ;  his  wants  are  of  the  fewest. 
He    could    live  comfortably   on   ten  shillings  a  week — 


EDISON   AND    EMPEROR   WILLIAM     183 

indeed,  he  spends  less  than  that  on  himself;  and  ii  he 
seems  pleased  to  earn  huge  sums,  it  is,  firstly,  because 
money  proves  that  his  ideas  and  inventions  are  popular 
and  successful,  and,  secondly,  because  the  possession  of 
large  wealth  enables  him  to  be  lavish  in  experimenting. 
He  is  never  prevented  from  testing  an  idea  for  the  want 
of  the  money,  and  has  spent  millions  in  his  laboratory  on 
research. 

Mrs.  Edison  had  invited  the  Cavaliere  Copello  to 
lunch  with  her  and  her  husband  on  the  Eiffel  Tower, 
chez  Brdbant ;  and  I  was  invited,  too.  Another  guest 
was  a  strange  young  man  who  had  written  a  book  on 
Edison,  and  who  clung  to  the  inventor's  coat-tails.  It 
was  this  young  man  who  afterwards  told  me  that  Edison 
had  said  that  he  would  send  me  a  phonograph  as  a  present 
as  soon  as  he  got  back  to  Orange.  The  phonograph 
never  came,  but  I  did  not  take  that  as  a  sign  that  the 
promise  had  never  been  made.  It  was  a  little  joke  of 
Edison's  to  promise  phonographs  to  people,  and  then  to 
forget  all  about  it.  The  Americans  were  hugely  delighted 
when  they  heard  that  the  Emperor  of  Germany  had 
reminded  Edison,  through  his  Minister  at  Washington, 
that  he  had  led  him  to  expect  a  model  of  the  wonderful 
machine,  and  that  Edison  had  answered  His  Excellency  : 
"  Yes,  now  I  come  to  think  of  it,  I  did  say  something 
to  the  young  man  about  sending  him  one."  It  seemed 
such  a  tribute  to  American  democracy  to  forget  a  promise 
made  to  an  Emperor,  and  to  speak  of  him  as  "  the 
young  man." 

My  ddjeimer  with  Edison  on  the  first  floor  of  the 
Eiffel  Tower  was  one  of  the  most  pleasant  meals  it  has 
ever  fallen  to  my  lot  to  share.  I  sat  next  to  the  great 
man,  and  we  talked  together  all  the  time.  "  When  we 
were  on  board  ship,"  he  said,  as  we  sat  down,  "  they  put 


iS4  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

rolls  and  cottec  on  the  tablt'  for  breakfast.  I  thought 
that  that  was  a  very  poor  breakfast  for  a  man  to  do  any 
work  upon.  But  I  suppose  that  one  gets  used  to  it. 
Still,  I  would  like  one  American  meal  for  a  change — 
plenty  of  pie,  for  a  change."  He  then  smashed  \\\s pclit 
pain  with  his  fist.  There  were  some  shrimps  among  the 
hors  (fceuvres,  and  he  looked  at  them  in  a  surprised  fashion. 
He  had  never  seen  shrimps  before.  "  Do  they  grow  any 
larger  ?  "  he  asked  me.  I  suppose  that  he  imagined  that 
they  were  the  young  of  lobsters.  When  I  told  him  that 
they  did  not  grow,  he  said  :  "  Well,  they  give  a  great  deal 
of  trouble  for  very  small  results." 

We  talked  of  many  things.  The  Tower,  of 
course,  came  under  discussion,  and  then  Edison  made 
the  remarks  which  I  quoted  to  Eiffel.  What  I  did 
not  tell  Eiffel  was  something  that  Edison  said  about 
him  personally  on  another  occasion,  for  I  knew  Eiffel 
to  be  a  modest  man.  What  Edison  then  said  was  :  "  I 
met  Monsieur  Eiffel  at  a  soirde  he  gave,  and  I  think  that 
he  is  just  the  nicest  fellow  that  I  have  met  since  I  came 
to  France,  so  simple  and  modest.  He  is  not  looking 
very  well.  I  daresay  that  it  is  his  work  and  all  the 
worries  attending  it  that  have  worn  him  out.  I  was  sorry 
to  see  him  looking  so  bad,  for  he  is  a  splendid  fellow. 
He  is  going  to  give  a  lunch  in  my  honour  on  the  very  top 
of  the  Tower  before  I  go  to  Germany." 

To  return  to  our  dejeuner,  I  asked  him  what  he 
thought  about  the  system  of  electrocution  which  was  then 
being  proposed  for  adoption  in  New  York  State — a 
subject  on  which  I  afterwards  made  a  careful  inquiry 
amongst  the  leading  scientists  in  Paris — when  Edison's 
opinion  was  supported  in  a  most  striking  manner.  "  It 
is  Westinghouse's  system,"  he  said,  "  that  is  to  be  used 
for  this  business,  and  it  is  being  employed  very  much 


EDISON    ON    ELECTROCUTION         185 

against  his  will.  He  is  indignant  that  his  studies  in 
electrical  science  should  be  put  to  such  a  use.  I,  too,  as 
an  electrician  .  ,  .  But,  then,  I  am  against  executions 
of  any  description.  Put  the  men  away,  and  make  them 
work." 

Over  the  soles  /rites  somebody  asked  him  if  it  were 
true  that  he  had  been  experimenting  in  photography  in 
colours.  He  said  :  "  No,  that  is  not  true.  That  sort 
of  thing  is  sentimental.  I  do  not  go  in  for  sentiment. 
Carnegie  does.  Poor  Carnegie  has  turned  sentimental, 
quite  sentimental.  When  I  saw  him  last  I  wanted  to 
talk  to  him  about  his  ironworks.  That  is  what  interests 
me — immense  factories  going  day  and  night,  with  the 
roar  of  the  furnaces  and  the  crashing  of  the  hammers  ; 
acres  and  acres  of  activity — man's  fight  with  the  metal. 
But  Carnegie  wouldn't  talk  about  it.  He  said,  'All  that 
is  brutal.'  He  is  now  interested  in,  and  will  only  talk 
about,  French  art  and  amateur  photography." 

Edison's  own  views  on  French  art  he  gave  me  on 
a  subsequent  occasion,  when  I  had  asked  him  if  the 
pictures  at  the  exhibition  had  pleased  him. 

"  Oh,  yes,"  he  then  said,  "  they  are  grand  art.  I  like 
modern  pictures  as  much  as  I  dislike  antique  stuff  I 
think  nothing  of  the  pictures  in  the  Louvre.  I  have  no 
use  for  the  old  things  ;  they  are  wretched  old  things. 
Now  the  pictures  in  the  Exhibition  are  all  as  new  and 
modern  as  they  can  be  ;    they  are  good." 

As  they  brought  in  the  Jilels  Brdbant  at  the  Eiffel 
Tower  dc^jeuner,  I  asked  him,  mimicking  little  Paul 
Dombey  on  a  famous  occasion,  "  What  is  electricity, 
after  all  ?  " 

Edison  said  :  "  It  is  a  mode  of  motion,  a  system  of 
vibrations.  A  certain  speed  of  vibration  produces  heat ; 
a  lower  speed,  light ;  still  lower,  something  else." 


i86  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

He  was  asked  whether  it  was  within  the  range  of 
practical  science  to  construct  a  machine  which  could  be 
adapted  to  the  head,  and  which  would  record  one's 
thoughts,  saving  the  trouble  of  speaking  or  of  writing. 

Edison  reflected.  Then  he  said  :  "  Such  a  machine 
is  possible!  But,"  he  added,  "just  think  if  it  were  to  be 
invented.  Every  man  would  flee  his  neighbour — flee  for 
his  life  to  any  shelter." 

I  asked  him  what  were  the  true  uses  of  electricity 
as  applied  to  medicine.  He  said  :  "  There  is  a  great 
deal  of  humbug  in  all  that."  Just  then  the  niaitre 
dliotel  was  pouring  out  the  cradled  Clos  Vougeot, 
serving  it  with  great  exaggerations  of  precaution  and 
almost  ludicrous  ceremonial.  "And,"  added  Edison, 
who  had  been  watching  him  with  an  amused  smile  on 
his  face,  "  there  is  a  great  deal  of  humbug  about  wine, 
too — and  about  cigars.  Men  go  by  cost.  The  real 
connoisseurs  are  few.  At  home,  for  fun,  I  keep  a  lot 
of  wretched  cigars  made  up  on  purpose  in  elegant 
wrappers,  some  with  hairs  in  them,  some  with  cotton- 
wool plugged  into  the  middle.  I  give  these  to  the 
critical  smokers — the  connoisseurs,  as  they  call  them- 
selves— and  I  tell  them  that  they  cost  me  35  cents, 
apiece.     You  should  hear  them  praise  them." 

I  said  :  "  What  you  say  about  wines,  Mr.  Edison,  is 
quite  correct.  Joseph,  Vanderbilt's  famous  chef,  told 
me  that  the  man  who  pays  more  than  a  dollar  a  bottle 
for  any  red  wine  at  even  the  finest  restaurant  in  Paris 
is  a  fool,  because  you  can  get  the  best  bottle  of  claret 
or  of  Burgundy  for  a  dollar.  When  you  select  higher- 
priced  wines  on  the  list,  you  are  paying  for  label  and 
dust." 

"  Is  that  the  Joseph  to  whom  Vanderbilt  is  said  to 
be  paying  ten  thousand  a  year  } "  he  asked.     When  I 


EDISON    AND    THE    SIMPLE    LIFE     187 

had  answered  in  the  affirmative,  he  remarked  :  "  Bright's 
disease  of  the  kidneys  is  all  the  dividend  that  that  man 
will  draw  for  his  investment  of  capital."  Edison,  by  the 
way,  seems  to  delight  in  making  use  of  commercial 
phrases.  It  is  a  treat  to  hear  him  pronounce  the  words 
"  make  money."  Commerciality  with  him,  as  I  have 
explained,  is  dignified  and  impressive,  vulgar  as  it  is 
with  most   men. 

Brebant's  ddjetmer  was  rechei^-ch^  in  the  extreme  ;  but 
Edison  barely  touched  anything.  "  A  pound  of  food  a 
day,"  he  told  me,  "  is  what  I  need  when  I  am  working, 
and  at  present  I  am  not  working."  And  as  just  then 
a  fresh  course  was  brought  in,  he  took  advantage  of  the 
open  door  and  slipped  out. 

A  minute  or  two  later  I  found  a  pretext  for  following. 
I  was  looking  about  for  him,  when  a  waiter  came  up  to 
me  and  said  :  "  Monsieur  cherche  son  pere  ?  Voila  le 
pere  de  monsieur,"  and  pointed  to  where  Edison  was 
leaning  over  the  railing,  gazing  down  at  the  people 
hundreds  of  feet  below.  He  told  me  that  he  was  cal- 
culating the  vibration  or  swaying  of  the  tower.  He 
laughed  when  I  had  told  him  what  the  waiter  had 
supposed,  and  asked  me  what  I  had  answered.  I 
said  :  "  I  told  him  that  I  was  not  le  Vicomte  Edison." 
"  Say,  Sherard,"  said  Edison,  "  don't  let  them  know  in 
New  York  about  that  tomfoolery  about  the  count  and 
countess.  They  would  never  stop  laughing  at  me  in 
New  York."  I  answered  :  "  I  am  very  sorry,  Mr.  Edison  ; 
you  ought  to  have  warned  me  before.  I  cabled  it  to 
New  York  from  the  hotel  just  one  minute  after  the 
announcement  was  made.  They  know  all  about  it 
by  now." 

He  laughed  very  good-humouredly,  and  said:  "Well, 
I   suppose  that  I   shall   have  to  put  up  with  it.     They 


i8S  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

will  be  getting  pictures  out  of  me  represented  as  an 
Italian  organ-grinder  with  a  crown  on  my  head,  and 
perhaps  Gouraud  as  the  monkey.  No,  I  don't  blame 
you.  It  was  a  '  beat,'  and  of  course  you  couldn't  miss 
it.  Besides,  our  Italian  friend  will  have  it  in  every 
paper  in  Paris  before  the  niyht  is  here." 

They  had  waited  in  the  breakfast-room  for  Edison's 
return  before  serving  champagne.  After  it  had  been 
poured  out,  toasts  were  proposed  and  drunk.  Edison 
said  to  me  :  "  The  Cavaliere  is  profuse,  but  not  so  much 
so  as  another  Italian  gentleman  who  once  proposed  my 
health,  and  who  remarked  that  even  the  chickens  in  his 
country  knew  my  name.  It's  a  regular  sanatorium,"  he 
observed  a  moment  later,  "so much  health  being  ladled 
out."  Again  :  "  All  this  is  new  and  strange  to  me," 
alluding  to  the  ceremonial  of  our  festivities.  "  If  I  stay 
long  in  this  country,  I,  too,  shall  soon  be  able  to  get  up 
and  make  speeches  and  wave  my  arms  about." 

When  the  coffee  and  cigars  came  in,  his  face 
brightened  up.  "  Mr.  Edison  is  beginning  to  breakfast 
now,"  said  Colonel  Gouraud. 

"Yes,"  said  Edison,  taking  an  Havannah,  "my 
breakfast  begins  with  this."  Then,  speaking  of  his  habit 
of  smoking,  he  added,  "  I  don't  find  smoking  harms  me 
in  the  least.  I  smoke  twenty  cigars  a  day,  and  the 
more  I   work  the  more  I  smoke." 

I  think  it  was  Mrs.  Edison  who  then  remarked : 
"  Mr.  Edison  has  an  iron  constitution,  and  does  every- 
thing that  is  contrary  to  the  laws  of  health  ;  yet  he  is 
never  ill." 

While  we  were  smoking,  the  Cavaliere  made  a  furious 
onslaught  on  his  host,  urging  him  to  come  to  Italy,  to 
be  presented  to  the  King,  who  was  most  anxious  to  see 
him.     Science,  Art,  and  Municipality  would  unite  to  do 


EDISON   AND   MR.   GLADSTONE       189 

him  honour.  Edison  was  very  emphatic  in  his  refusal 
of  these  honours.  He  shook  his  head,  and  Edison  has 
a  way  of  shaking  his  head  which  is  a  more  decided 
negative  than  all  the  circles  of  the  Greek  artist.  "  No," 
he  said,  "  my  nerves  won't  stand  it.  I  shall  just  go 
quietly  back  to  the  States  from  Paris.  I  shan't  go  to 
London,  even,  that  most  cheerful  of  places.  I  am  all 
topsy-turvy  in  my  head  as  it  is." 

When  I  took  leave  of  my  hosts  on  that  occasion,  the 
Cavaliere  was  still  urging  his  point  and  Edison  was  still 
shaking  his  head. 

I  frequently  saw  him  again  in  Paris,  and  about  a 
month  later,  just  before  he  was  leaving  for  Berlin,  I  had 
another  long  talk  with  him  at  his  hotel.  I  had  found 
him  looking  rather  pale,  and  I  had  remarked  upon  it. 
He  said  :  "  At  first  it  was  my  head  that  worried  me  in 
Paris.  I  was  quite  dazed  ;  but  now  the  worry  is  lower 
down — the  effect  of  all  these  dinners.  Another  banquet, 
or  whatever  you  call  it,  last  night  upset  me  dreadfully. 
And,"  he  added,  with  a  groan,  "  I  have  a  whole  lot 
more  banquets  to  attend  before  I  leave  for  Berlin.  I  am 
going  there  to  see  my  friend  Dr.  Siemens,  and  after  that 
I  may  visit  Krupp's  works  at  Essen.  They  seem  very 
anxious  for  me  to  come." 

Mr.  Gladstone  was  in  Paris  at  the  time,  and  I  asked 
Edison  if  he  had  yet  met  him.  He  said  :  "  No,  I  have 
only  seen  him  across  the  road  at  the  window  of  his 
apartment  in  the  Bristol  Hotel.  I  see,  though,  in 
this  morning's  Figaro  that  he  has  expressed  a  desire 
to  make  my  acquaintance,  and  that  both  he  and  Mrs. 
Gladstone  had  left  very  pretty  messages  for  me  in  one 
of  my  phonographs  at  the  Exhibition." 

As  to  the  Exhibition  itself,  he  was  not  particularly 
enthusiastic.     He  said  :  "  It  is  a  sadly  tiring  place.     The 


I90  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

machinery  hall  is  too  biq;,  altogether  too  big,  miles  and 
miles  too  much  of  it.  1  have  a  headache  when  I  even 
think  of  it.  I  can't  say  that  I've  seen  a  quarter  of  what 
is  to  be  seen  there,  and  I  don't  suppose  that  I  ever  will. 
So  far  as  I  have  seen.  I  have  not  been  struck  by  any 
novelty  on  a  large  scale.  There  are  plenty  of  improve- 
ments in  small  things,  clever  little  dodges,  especially  in 
the  milling-screw  machines,  and  many  improvements  in 
matters  of  detail,  but  nothing  new  in  the  way  of  inven- 
tions of  whole  machines.  The  French  inventors,  such 
as  they  are,   seem  to  go  in  for  detail." 

"  Why  do  you  say  '  such  as  they  are,'  Mr.  Edison  ?  " 
'■  Oh.  they  don't  have  inventors,  in  our  American 
sense  of  the  word,  in  Paris  at  all.  They  haven't  any 
professional  inventors  here,  as  we  have  on  the  other  side  ; 
that  is  to  say,  men  who  will  go  into  a  factory,  sit  down 
and  solve  any  problem  that  may  be  put  before  them. 
That  is  is  a  profession  which  they  seem  to  know  nothing 
about  over  here.  In  America  we  have  hundreds  of  such 
men.  I  can't  say,"  he  added,  speaking  of  the  American 
Exhibition,  "  that  ours  is  at  all  a  creditable  show.  What 
there  is  good,  but  then  there  is  just  nothing  ;  it  represents 
nothing.  It  represents  American  industry  just  as  much  as 
that  cabhorse  out  there  represents  the  animal  kingdom.  It 
is  a  one-horse  concern  altogether.  I  am  quite  of  Chauncey 
Depew'sopinion  on  the  subject.  Depew  said :  '  The  Ameri- 
can citizen  drapes  himself  in  the  American  flag  as  he  enters 
the  Exhibition  by  the  Trocadero.  After  he  has  visited 
the  American  section,  he  takes  off  that  flag  and  folds  it 
up  and  puts  it  into  his  pocket.'  That's  just  how  I  feel 
about  it.  I  must  say  that  the  Eiffel  Tower  is  grand,  and, 
after  that,  what  impresses  me  most  is  the  machinery  hall. 
It  impressed  me  almost  painfully  on  account  of  its  im- 
mensity.     I  think  that  if  they  had  made  everything  on  a 


EDISON   AND   CARNOT  191 

much  smaller  scale  at  the  Exhibition,  people  would  have 
enjoyed  it  ever  so  much  more." 

Since  my  last  visit  to  the  Hotel  du  Rhin,  Edison's 
drawing-room  bore  many  outward  signs  of  the  popularity 
which  he  was  enjoying  in  Paris.  Baskets  of  the  rarest 
flowers,  floral  offerings  to  Mrs.  Edison,  crowded  every 
piece  of  furniture.  A  mass  of  beautiful  passion-flowers 
half  hid  a  model  of  the  phonograph.  A  box  of  talking 
cylinders  was  almost  invisible  behind  an  enormous 
bouquet  from  Madame  Carnot,  choking  as  it  were  with 
Republican  fragrance  the  voices  of  the  numberless  princes 
and  potentates  which  lay  bottled  up  therein.  For  Edison 
himself  there  were  photographs  of  almost  every  man  of 
note  in  Paris.  There  was  a  portrait  of  Monsieur  Eiffel 
on  the  mantelpiece,  one  of  Monsieur  Tirard,  the  Prime 
Minister,  on  the  sideboard,  and  one  of  President  Carnot 
on  the  sofa.  On  each  photograph  was  an  autograph 
dedication,  couched  in  most  flattering  terms. 

I  asked  him  how  he  liked  the  President. 

"  Very  much,"  he  answered.  "  Carnot  is  so  simple 
and  modest.  He  is  an  engineer,  you  know,  and  a  very 
clever  one  too.  He  knows  all  about  everything.  I 
fancy  that  of  all  the  thousands  who  have  visited  the 
Exhibition  he  is  the  man  who  has  the  best  understood 
and  appreciated  it.  He  has  been  very  friendly  to  me  and 
said  many  things,  flattering  things,  to  me  ;  but  he  does 
not  say  much  at  any  time.  As  to  Prime  Minister  Tirard, 
I  dined  with  him  the  other  night,  but  I  did  not  have 
any  conversation  with  him.  He  is  a  political  man,  and 
I   know  nothing  about  politics." 

"  Oh  !"  I  said,  "  he  is  a  watchmaker,  too,  and  could 
have  told  you  all  about  springs  and  movements  and  things 
of  that  kind." 

"Well,  I  didn't  know  that.     I  thought  it  was  all  the 


192  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

political  racket  lliat  w  is  in  his  head.  I  have  been  well 
treated  here.  Indeed,  I  have  been  greatly  astonished  at 
the  cordiality  of  our  reception.  We  have  been  treated 
with  princely  hospitality — rather  too  princely  indeed  for 
my  comfort." 

Before  I  took  my  final  farewell  of  Edison,  he  kindly 
asked  me,  in  the  event  of  my  going  to  New  York,  to 
come  and  see  him  at  his  works.  I  have  often  since 
regretted  that  during  my  short  stay  in  America  I  did  not 
avail  myself  of  this  invitation  and  renew  an  acquaintance 
which  had  given  me  so  much  pleasure.  But  after  my 
experiences  at  Ellis  Island — to  undergo  which  was  the 
purpose  of  my  voyage  to  the  States — I  had  only  one 
desire,  as  soon  as  I  had  written  out  my  account  of  the 
way  in  which  pauper  aliens  used  to  be  treated  in  that  place 
of  detention — and  that  was  to  hurry  home  to  Europe  and 
a  kinder  world  with  all  the  speed  that  I  could  compass.^ 

^  "  Used  to  be  treated."  I  had  the  good  fortune  to  attract  the 
attention  of  President  Roosevelt  to  the  abominable  state  of  things 
then  prevailing  in  Ellis  Island  by  the  published  account  of  my 
experiences  there.  He  ordered  an  immediate  inquiry  to  be  made,  and, 
finding  that  the  abuses,  as  I  had  described  them,  existed,  in  spite 
of  all  official  repudiations  of  my  veracity,  appointed  Commissioner 
Williams  to  carry  out  the  most  drastic  reforms. 


CHAPTER    XIII 

On  Electrocution  —  Edison's  Disapproval  prompts  a  Close  Inquiry — 
Unanimous  Condemnation  by  Leading  Scientists — The  Executioner's 
View — Monsieur  de  Boer,  Editor  of  U Electricite- — Monsieur  Joubert's 
Experiments  —  Monsieur  Cornu  — "  Science  has  no  Place  in  the 
Shambles" — The  Greatest  Physiologist — Doctor  d' Arson val — A  Scathing 
Denunciation — "  Impracticable,  Illogical,  and  Uncertain" — Death  only 
Apparent — Electrical  Asphyxia  a  Hideous  Torture — Dr.  Brown- 
Se'quard's  Opinion — Unanimous  Accordance  of  German  Scientists — 
American  Indifiference — How  I  missed  Fame  and  Fortune. 

IN  the  course  of  one  of  my  conversations  with  Thomas 
Alva  Edison,  he  expressed  to  me,  in  his  usual 
emphatic  manner,  his  disapproval,  both  as  a  man  and  as 
a  scientist,  of  the  proposed  reform  in  the  matter  of  capital 
executions  in  the  State  of  New  York.  Since  then 
electrocution  has  been  practised  in  that  State  as  well 
as  in  other  American  States  which  have  followed  its 
pernicious  example,  and  to  humanity  is  afforded  the 
abominable  spectacle  of  men  being  put  to  death  by  law 
in  a  manner  uncertain,  protracted,  and  cruel. 

In  the  minds  of  many  people  in  the  Old  World  the 
idea  obtains  that  electrocution  was  only  adopted  in  New 
York  State,  not  because  it  kills  in  a  speedy,  absolute, 
and  therefore  merciful  manner,  but  because  certain  New 
Yorkers  desired  at  any  cost  to  posture  as  in  the  very  van 
of  scientific  progress.  As,  in  spite  of  the  continued 
opposition  of  true  scientists,  to  say  nothing  of  the  humani- 
tarians, electrocution  continues  to  be  practised,  and  seems, 

193  13 


104  TWF.XTV   YKARS    IN    PARIS 

after  fifiecn  years,  to  have  acquired  that  fixity  of  tenure 
hv  wliich  e\en  the  most  e\il  things  impose  respect,  it 
may  be  of  service  in  enhghtening  the  public  as  to  the 
real  nature  of  this  abuse  to  repeat  some  of  the  opinions 
on  the  subject  of  execution  of  criminals  by  this  means 
which  were  expressed  to  me  shortly  before  the  bar- 
barous death  of  the  murderer  Kemmler.  With  Edison's 
remarks  on  electrocution  very  fresh  in  my  mind,  I 
was  more  horrified  perhaps  than  most  people  by  the 
dreadful  prospect  of  the  sufferings  which  that  wretched 
man  was  to  endure  at  the  hand  of  his  justiciaries,  and 
I  determined  to  consult  on  the  question  the  leading 
scientists  in  France,  and  to  lay  their  opinions  before  the 
people  of  America. 

I  did  not  find  one  sing"le  man  of  science  who  was 
not  opposed  to  the  use  of  electricity  for  the  judicial 
destruction  of  life,  and  to-day,  fifteen  years  after  these 
horrible  forebodings  were  realised,  not  one  of  the  men 
whom  I  consulted  has  seen  any  reason  to  modify  the 
opinions  which  he  then  expressed.  Those  opinions 
may  be  summed  up  in  the  words  that  electrocution  is 
cruel  and  uncertain  ;  that  no  current  is  absolutely  fatal  ; 
that  death  by  electricity,  although,  as  in  drowning,  the 
patient  dies  from  asphyxia,  unlike  drowning,  is  painful. 
I  think  that  this  is  a  matter  of  which  the  public  should 
be  reminded. 

The  first  person  whom  I  sought  out  in  the  course  of 
this  inquiry  was  Monsieur  Deibler,  the  public  execu- 
tioner. I  was  determined  to  let  no  personal  considerations 
stand  in  the  way  of  making  the  case  against  this  new 
form  of  torture  as  clear  as  possible,  and  it  was  as  well 
that  people  should  be  forced  to  face  the  fact  that  this 
reform  was  one  in  which  Schinderhannes  took  as  keen 
an    interest    as    any    notoriety-seeking    dabbler    in    the 


THE    EXECUTIONER'S   VIEW  195 

sciences.  Monsieur  Deibler,  who  interrupted  a  game  of 
la  manille  in  his  favourite  cafe  on  the  Boulevard  Voltaire 
to  talk  to  me,  reminded  me  with  some  pride  that  he  had 
"  assisted  at  over  three  hundred  executions,"  and  then 
went  on  to  give  his  opinion.  It  was  that  the  New  York 
Legislature  was  making  a  great  mistake,  "  Une  bourde, 
m'sieu,  une  vraie  bourde,  ce  qu'on  appelle  une  bourde," 
and  that  the  Americans  would  find  by  experience  that 
the  new  system  would  not  work  satisfactorily.  He  added 
that  no  means  of  execution  can  beat  the  guillotine,  which 
he  considered  a  perfectly  painless  form  of  death.  He 
said  that  the  real  punishment  of  the  condemned  man 
comes  when  the  news  of  his  approaching  end  is  announced 
to  him,  and  that  afterwards  he  falls  into  such  a  state  of 
terror  that  he  is  really  unconscious  of  all  that  ensues  from 
the  time  he  leaves  his  cell  to  the  moment  when  the  knife 
falls.  Monsieur  Deibler  hoped  to  live  to  see  the  day 
when  all  nations,  following  the  lead  of  France  in  this 
as  in  all  other  matters,  would  adopt  the  guillotine. 

Monsieur  de  Boer,  the  editor  of  the  technical  journal 
U ElectiHcite,  then  the  principal  organ  of  electrical 
science  in  France,  said  :  "  My  personal  objections  to 
electrocution  are  based  more  on  sentimental  grounds.  I 
consider  electricity  too  beautiful  a  thing  to  be  used  in 
work  of  that  kind.  But,  of  course,  that  is  an  objection 
which  would  not  weigh  a  feather  weight  with  such 
practical  people  as  the  Americans.  I  may  tell  you  that 
the  subject  is  creating  great  interest  in  technical  circles 
in  Paris,  and  that  we  are  all  awaiting  the  result  with 
great  scientific  curiosity.  What  will  be  Kemmler's 
manner  of  death  ?  We  have  frequendy  talked  about  the 
matter  in  this  office,  and  I  have  not  heard  one  man 
express  himself  in  favour  of  the  innovation.  Monsieur 
Joubert,  one  of  the  greatest  of  French  electricians,  who 


196  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

was  in  here  a  ivw  days  ago.  said  that  in  three  cases  out 
of  five  in  which  he  had  experimented  upon  animals  with 
the  lethal  apparatus — an  apparatus  similar,  as  far  as  he 
could  judge,  to  the  one  that  is  in  readiness  for  Kemmler's 
execution — the  current  had  to  be  delivered  twice  before 
the  desired  effect  was  produced.  What  was  a  matter  of 
little  importance  where  rabbits  were  the  victims  becomes 
naturally  of  very  serious  importance  indeed  where  the 
life  of  a  human  being  is  in  question.  We  understand 
over  here  that  in  America  it  was  considered  that  death 
inflicted  by  electricity  would  be  much  less  painful  than 
death  on  the  gallows.  I  am  not  at  all  certain  of  the 
correctness  of  that  opinion.  I  imagine  that  the  passage 
of  the  current  through  the  body  of  the  condemned  man 
will  produce  hellish  torture.  It  is  contended,  I  am  aware, 
that  death  will  be  so  rapid  that  the  victim  will  feel 
nothing ;  but  this  argument  is  urged  by  people  who 
ignore  the  truth  that  to  the  man  in  the  expectation  of 
death  time  is  infinitely  longer  than  under  ordinary  cir- 
cumstances. One  second  to  the  man  under  the  knife  of  the 
guillotine  is  a  long  period  of  suffering — a  fact  which  is 
known  to  every  physiologist  who  has  studied  the  question. 
It  is,  therefore,  nonsense  to  say  that  death  by  electro- 
cution will  be  as  quick  as  it  is  painless." 

Both  the  Monsieur  Joubert  referred  to  above  and 
Monsieur  Maxime  Cornu,  one  of  the  most  distinguished 
professors  of  the  College  de  France,  spoke  emphatically 
in  favour  of  the  old  methods.  Monsieur  Cornu  said  : 
"  I  have  a  very  great  admiration  for  the  inventiveness 
and  the  spirit  of  progress  of  the  Americans.  I  fully 
appreciate  the  immense  services  that  they  have  rendered 
to  science  in  the  domain  of  electricity,  for  example  ;  but  I 
cannot  congratulate  them  on  this  last  departure.  Science 
has  no  place  in  the  shambles.      If  the  death  penalty  has 


A    UNANIMOUS   DISAPPROVAL         197 

to  be  inflicted  at  all,  the  old  methods  are  decidedly- 
preferable.  I  have  not  heard  a  single  one  of  my  confreres 
express  a  contrary  opinion.  We  look  upon  this  experi- 
ment as  a  costly  farce.  I  am  aware  that  some  people 
contend  that  it  is  being  done  from  a  merciful  feeling,  that 
electrocution  has  been  invented  expressly  to  accelerate 
the  death  of  the  condemned  man  ;  but  surely  the  gallows, 
the  guillotine,  and  the  garrotte  effect  their  purpose  admir- 
ably. After  all,  the  death-penalty  is  intended  as  a 
punishment,  and  I  ask  why  should  its  penalty  be 
diminished  when  at  the  same  time  a  great  danger  is 
incurred  that  the  condemned  man  may  be  unnecessarily 
tortured  ?  I  confess  that  I  have  not  looked  into  the 
matter  as  closely  as  I  might  have  done,  but  the  con- 
victions which  I  have  expressed  are  very  strong  ones 
with  me,  and  nothing  that  I  have  read  on  the  subject 
has  induced  me  to  alter  them  one  jot." 

The  opinion,  however,  to  which  I  even  then  attached 
most  importance,  was  that  of  Doctor  d'Arsonval,  of  the 
College  de  France,  who  to-day  ranks  as  one  of  the  fore- 
most physiologists  and  electrical  scientists  in  the  world. 
In  1890  he  was  still  pr^parateur  to  Doctor  Brown- 
Sequard,  and  this  fact  may  have  detracted  a  little  from 
the  value  of  the  most  emphatic  declaration  which  he  then 
made  to  me  on  this  important  question.  For  at  that 
time  Brown-Sequard  had  excited  considerable  ridicule 
in  the  scientific  world  by  the  failure  of  the  serum  of 
perpetual  youth  which  he  imagined  himself  to  have 
discovered.  He  had  announced  to  the  world  that  in 
his  laboratory  he  had  been  able  to  compose  a  fluid 
which,  when  injected  into  the  feeblest  and  least  virile 
of  old  men,  would  produce  upon  them  all  the  happy 
effects  that  in  the  Middle  Ages  were  attributed  to 
the  waters  of  the  Fountain  of  Jouvence. 


198  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

It  can  be  readily  imagined  that  here  was  a  topic 
which  lent  itself  to  the  purposes  of  the  prurient  wit  of 
the  boulevards.  The  laboratory  in  the  Rue  Claude- 
Berniird,  where  great  things  had  been  done,  and  where 
under  d'Arsonval  still  greater  things  were  to  be  done, 
was  at  that  time,  to  some  extent,  under  the  ban  of 
public  opinion.  Otherwise,  I  cannot  see  how  after  such 
a  pronouncement  as  the  one  I  am  about  to  quote,  from 
a  scientist  of  d'Arsonval's  standing,  the  purpose  of  the 
American  experimenters  could  have  survived  a  single 
hour.  "  I  am  entirely  opposed  to  the  plan  of  executing 
human  beings  by  electricity,"  he  said.  "  I  consider  it 
impracticable,  illogical,  and  above  all  uncertain.  This  is 
also  the  opinion  of  every  one  of  my  confreres  with  whom 
I  have  spoken  on  the  subject.  I  do  not  deny  that  death 
can  be  produced  by  means  of  these  appliances,  but  not 
definitely  in  every  case.  Electricity  applied  to  the 
human  body  produces  death  either  by  direct  action 
(that  is,  by  the  disruptive  effect  of  the  discharge  in  the 
nerve  tissues)  or  by  reflex  or  indirect  action  on  the 
nerve  centres.  The  effects  are  greatly  varied,  and  have 
been  fully  explained  by  my  friend  and  master,  Doctor 
Brown-Sequard,  under  the  names  of  inhibition  and 
dynamogenics.  This  simple  distinction,  which  is  estab- 
lished by  a  most  careful  study  of  the  facts,  has  a  practical 
value  in  this  respect,  that  in  the  first  case  insensibility 
is  fatal  and  definite,  while  in  the  second  case,  as  my 
experiments  have  shown  me,  the  patient  can  be  brought 
back  to  life.  The  only  cases  in  which  I  have  been  able 
to  produce  death  irrevocably  have  been  where  I  have 
laid  bare  the  spinal  cord  and  have  applied  the  current 
directly  to  the  naked  mass.  Of  course,  it  will  not  be 
practicable  for  the  executioner  to  do  that,  and  it  would  be 
infinitely  simpler  for  him  just  to  thrust  the  knife  into  the 


DEATH    ONLY   APPARENT  199 

spinal  cord.  That  would  have  exactly  the  same  effect 
as  the  electric  current,  namely,  it  would  disorganise  the 
nervous  tissues  so  completely  as  to  cause  death." 

"  But,"  I  said,  "  you  have  produced  death  ?  " 

"  Yes,"   said  Doctor   d'Arsonval    gloomily,   "  if  you 
like  to  call  it  so." 

"  How  '  if  you  like  to  call  it  so '  ?  " 

"  Death  is  only  apparent   in   these  cases.     In  every 
instance  it  was   within   my   power    to   bring  the  victim 
back  to  life  by  practising  artificial  respiration  upon  the 
body.     Suppose  that  I  have  electrocuted  two  big  dogs. 
I  leave  one  alone  and  begin  to  practise  artificial  respira- 
tion on  the  other.      In  a  few   minutes   the  latter  regains 
consciousness,  and   soon    is   as  well  as  if  he  had  been 
saved  from  drowning.     The  former  dies  from  exactly  the 
same  cause  which  kills  the  drowning  man — that  is  to  say, 
from  asphyxiation.     I  have  thus  killed  and  brought  back 
to  life  again  the  same  dog   ten   times  running.     At  the 
end  of  the  experiments  he  was  just  as  well  as  before  I 
commenced   them.     One    might    make   this    sentimental 
objection  to  execution  by  electricity,  that  it  will  be  terrible 
for  the  executioner,  and  those  who  back  him  up  in  his 
horrid    work,    to    know    that    after    the   body  has  been 
removed  from  the  lethal  chair,  they  can,  if  they  choose, 
recall    their   victim    back    to   life.      I    cannot    determine 
exactly  how  long  it   takes   before  the  asphyxiation  does 
its  work  and  the  victim   finally  succumbs,  but  I  believe 
that  it  is  a  very  long  while  in  many  cases,      I  base  this 
theory  on  the  fact  that  persons   who   have  been  a  long 
while  under  water  can  be  restored  to  life  by  the  means  I 
have  mentioned.      For  my  part,  I   have  always  applied 
the  restorative  treatment  immediately,  and,  as   I   say,    I 
have  never  once  failed  in  bringing  the  animal  back  to 
life  and    health." 


200  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

"  Is  it  absolutely  certain,"  I  asked,  "  that  death  by 
electricity  is  caused  by  asphyxiation  ?  " 

"  The  remedies  which  cure  asphyxiation  restore  life  to 
the  man  who  accidentally,  or  the  animal  who  purposely, 
has  been  submitted  to  the  electric  shock,  and  when  I 
have  dissected  the  bodies  either  of  animals  or  of  men 
who  have  succumbed  to  this  shock,  administered  by 
any  known  dynamos,  I  have  been  unable  to  find  any 
traces  other  than  those  which  are  left  by  asphyxiation. 
Thus  the  heart  is  always  found  to  be  in  a  state  of 
complete  contraction.  Of  a  disorganisation  of  the 
nerve    tissues   there  is  little  or  no  vesti^^e." 

"  But  just  now  you  said  that  in  one  or  two  cases,  by 
using  certain  machines,  you  had  been  able  to  produce 
absolute  dissolution  ?" 

"  That  was  when  I  was  fortunate  enough  to  apply 
the  current  so  that  its  effect  was  produced  directly  on 
the  bulb  or  brain  centre — a  circumstance  which  occurs 
so  irregularly  that  it  can  be  described  as  of  anything 
but  certain  effect.  The  practical  objection  against  the 
proposed  plan  is  this  :  So  much  apparatus  is  needed  for 
such  a  purpose,  a  steam-engine,  a  battery,  an  electrician, 
besides  the  hangman,  and  I  do  not  know  what  else 
besides.  It  is  much  too  complicated.  The  guillotine 
attains  the  same  result  so  much  more  simply.  Here  in 
France  we  think  that  it  is  morbid  curiosity  that  prompted 
the  Americans  to  take  this  resolution." 

I  remarked  as  to  the  uncertainty  of  death  that  surely 
lightning  killed  instantaneously. 

"Yes,"  said  Doctor  d'Arsonval,  "so  it  does;  but  there 
is  no  battery  made  by  the  hands  of  man  which  has  the 
force  of  lightning.  A  shock  like  that  is,  of  course, 
enough  to  disrupt  all  the  centres  and  to  produce  death. 
But   there   is   no   battery   yet  constructed,  and    I  might 


A    HIDEOUS   TORTURE  201 

almost  say  constructable,  which  is  able  to  produce  any- 
such  effect." 

I  told  the  doctor  that  many  of  the  physiologists  with 
whom  I  had  conversed  on  the  subject  had  expressed 
the  opinion  that  death  by  electricity  is  very  painful. 

"  Do  not  call  it  death  by  electricity,"  he  said.  "You 
should  call  it  death  from  asphyxia  caused  by  electric 
shock.  Then  I  am  of  their  opinion.  I  imagine  that 
no  more  hideous  death  than  this  can  be  inflicted,  and  I 
will  tell  you  why.  Electrical  asphyxia,  as  I  may  call  it, 
does  not  resemble  death  by  any  other  kind  of  asphyxia. 
In  almost  every  case  of  asphyxiation,  other  than  by 
electric  asphyxia,  consciousness  is  entirely  suspended, 
and  the  victim  glides  insensibly  from  life  to  death. 
Electrical  asphyxia  resembles  far  more  the  asphyxia 
caused  by  the  poison  curare  with  which  the  Indians 
used  to  tip  their  arrows.  This  poison  produces  in  its 
victim  complete  immobility.  Every  motive  power  in 
his  body  is  paralysed.  He  cannot  breathe  ;  he  cannot 
move  a  muscle.  But  he  retains  his  consciousness  to  the 
end.  He  sees,  he  hears,  he  feels,  he  knows  everything 
that  is  going  on  around  him.  There  is  no  greater 
mistake  than  to  imagine  that  the  absence  of  movement 
in  electrified  people  denotes  a  loss  of  feeling. 

"  I  have  experimented  with  curare  on  dogs,  and  have 
found  the  effects  to  be  identical  in  every  respect  to 
those  produced  by  asphyxia  from  electrical  shock. 
Here  also  I  have  been  able  to  restore  the  victim  to  life 
by  practising  artificial  respiration.  I  have  thus  experi- 
mented ten  times  running  on  the  same  dog.  As  I  say, 
the  effects  are  exactly  the  same,  and  in  both  cases  death 
is  produced  by  asphyxiation.  In  the  one  case — namely, 
that  of  poisoning  by  curare — we  know  for  a  fact  that 
consciousness   is  not   suspended,  and  this  allows   us   to 


202  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

fear  lh;U  in  the  case  of  electrical  asphyxia  the  same 
phenomenon  is  produced.  Is  it  not  terrible  to  think 
that,  when  the  condemned  man  is  removed  from  the 
lethal  chair,  he  may  be  as  fully  conscious  of  what  is 
going  on  around  him  as  any  man  present  in  the 
execution  chamber  ?  I,  for  my  part,  believe  that  he  will 
be  so,  unless  by  rare  good  luck  the  executioner  has  been 
able  to  determine  the  right  spot  on  the  man's  head 
against  which  to  direct  the  current — namely,  that  which 
corresponds  exactly  with  the  bulb.  This,  of  course, 
differs  on  every  head. 

"  And  is  it  not  more  terrible  to  think  that  this  fearful 
torture  of  death  in  life  may  be  prolonged  for  many 
hours  ?  The  victim  will  see  the  preparations  being  made 
for  his  own  post-mortem !  No,  I  am  most  decidedly 
opposed  to  this  innovation.  I  consider  it  neither 
practical  nor  humane,  and,  above  all,  it  is  uncertain. 
That  is  the  opinion  of  us  all.  Only  a  day  or  two  ago 
Doctor  Brown-Sequard  said:  '  It  is  scandalous  that  an 
unknown  agent  should  be  used  for  such  a  purpose.'  The 
responsibility  of  the  men  who  passed  that  Bill  and  the 
responsibility  of  the  men  who  will  carry  out  its  provisions 
is  indeed  a  terrible  one." 

In  Germany  the  unanimous  opinions  of  all  the  lead- 
ing scientists  was  in  full  accordance  with  that  expressed 
in  France.  Our  protest,  however,  was  without  avail. 
Kemmler's  martyrdom  followed  closely  on  the  broadcast 
publication  in  America  of  d'Arsonval's  terrible  indictment 
of  the  new  method  ;  and  who  has  forgotten,  even  after 
fifteen  years,  the  sickening  details  of  his  prolonged 
torture  and  agonising  death  ? 

The  leading  Americans  themselves,  whom  I  used  to 
meet  in  Paris — men  of  standing  in  many  fields  :  poli- 
ticians,   Senators,   and    Congressmen,    ex-Secretaries  of 


AMERICAN    INDIFFERENCE  203 

State,  Ministers  on  their  way  to  their  embassies,  pro- 
minent editors,  princes  of  finance,  the  most  famous  men 
and  women  of  letters — seemed,  when  I  asked  them  for 
a  disavowal  of  the  abominable  system  which  disgraced 
the  State  of  New  York,  to  consider  that  people  who 
got  so  low  down  in  the  world  as  to  be  eligible  for  the 
electric  chair  were  people  about  whom  it  was  really  a 
waste  of  time  to  trouble  one's  head. 

In  a  commercial  country  the  man  who  has  failed  and 
is  bankrupt  ceases  to  be  a  man  of  any  account  whatever ; 
and  what  more  deplorable  schedule  of  bankruptcy  can  a 
wretched  man  file  than  one  in  which  he  cannot  even  set 
down  a  right  to  existence  as  an  asset  ?  It  was  impressed 
upon  me  in  some  cases  that  the  people  who  spoke  to 
me  had  no  sympathy  to  waste  on  persons  of  such  very 
small  social  importance.  In  other  cases  I  found  that 
never  a  thought  had  been  given  to  the  matter,  and 
**  That  so  ?  "  was  all  the  comment  that  was  elicited  when 
I  repeated  what  d'Arsonval  had  told  me  of  the  horrors 
of  the  electric  chair. 

I  must  not  omit  to  mention,  as  an  illustration  of  the 
ethics  of  the  new  journalism,  that  when  I  told  the  editor 
of  the  paper  in  which  I  printed  the  protest  of  the  French 
scientists,  that  d'Arsonval  had  offered  to  electrocute 
me  and  restore  me  to  life,  thus  pledging  his  reputation 
on  the  truth  of  his  theory  that  death  was  only  apparent, 
and  consciousness  was  fully  retained  during  asphyxia 
by  electric  shock,  and  giving  me  a  splendid  opportunity 
of  proving  my  case  against  the  system  which  we  were 
denouncing,  the  editor  said  :  "  Well,  and  why  didn't  you 
tell  him  to  go  ahead  ?  That  would  have  made  a  good 
story  for  the  paper.  It  would  have  been  a  scoop,  and 
it  would  have  been  suitably  remunerated." 


CHAPTER   XIV 

Ernest  Renan— On  Future  Punishment — The  Genesis  of  the  Idea — Its 
Development— The  BeHef  of  the  Romans— The  Inferno  of  the  Bud- 
dhists—Ernest Renan  as  a  Man — His  Home  in  the  College  de  France — 
A  Man  of  Many  Books — His  Opinion  on  the  Naturahsts— Renan  and 
Daudet. 

ONE  of  the  distinguished  Americans  to  whom  I 
repeated  what  Monsieur  d'Arsonval  had  said 
about  the  tortures  which  a  man  under  electrocution  must 
endure,  remarked  in  an  offhand  way  that  as  a  convicted 
murderer  was  bound  in  all  justice  to  go  to  hell,  these 
tortures  would  be  a  sort  of  preparation  for  him,  "  a  kind 
of  letting  him    down  gradually." 

It  is  because  the  subject  of  electrocution  has  re- 
minded me  of  this  that  I  am  led  to  think  also  of  a 
long  and  interesting  conversation  which  I  once  had — 
it  was  in  1892 — with  Monsieur  Ernest  Renan  about 
that  place  of  future  torment  which  we  know  by  the 
name  of  Hell.  Renan  denied  that  we  have  any  Old 
Testament  authority  whatsoever  for  believing  in  the 
existence  of  such  a  place.  I  remember  that  on  calling 
on  him  that  day  in  his  rooms  at  the  College  de  France, 
I  said  to  him  :  "  Master,  I  have  come  to  talk  to  you 
about  hell.  You  are  being  much  criticised  in  England  for 
your  writings  and  your  unbelief.  In  no  country  is  the 
odium  theologiami  so  strong  as  in  England,  and  it  has 

been  poured  forth  upon  you." 

204 


ON    FUTURE    PUNISHMENT  205 

He  smiled  and  raised  his  shoulders,  and  smiled 
again  ;  then  deprecatingly  stretching  forth  plump,  beauti- 
ful white  hands,  he  said  : 

"  We  must  blame  nobody  for  absurdity  of  religious 
beliefs.  There  are  things  in  religion  which  are  infantine 
in  their  absurdity.  But  tradition,  atavism,  education, 
aye,  and  patriotism,  will  make  even  enlightened  men 
accept — where  religious  belief  is  concerned — things  at 
which  in  everyday  life  they  would  be  the  first  to  smile. 
That  explains  why  men  who  are  justly  reputed  to 
be  master-minds  are  really  true  believers.  It  is  not 
hypocrisy  on  their  parts ;  they  are  sincere.  Family 
traditions,  atavism,  and  patriotism  create  their  faiths." 

"  Since  when  have  people  held  this  dreadful  creed 
of  future  punishment — this  belief  in  hell  ?"   I  asked. 

"  Since  about  one  hundred  and  fifty  years  before  the 
birth  of  Christ.  The  Jews  of  the  Old  Testament  had 
no  belief  in  a  future  state  ;  at  least,  you  will  find  no 
allusion  whatever  to  either  the  future  punishment  of 
the  evil  or  the  future  beatitude  of  the  good  in  the 
Old  Testament.  The  reason  of  this  was,  no  doubt, 
that  up  to  the  period  which  I  mention  the  Jews  were 
fairly  happy.  But  in  175  b.c.  Epiphanes  Antiochus 
came  and  persecuted  the  Jews  terribly.  Then  they 
suffered  horrors  of  gibbet  and  sword,  of  torture  and  fire, 
and  many  of  them  were  martyred.  It  was  then  that 
the  belief  arose  that  those  who  had  suffered  martyrdom 
should  in  after-life  be  compensated  for  their  terrible 
sufferings,  whilst  to  the  executioners  and  torturers,  the 
valets  of  Epiphanes,  future  punishment  should  be  dealt 
out.  The  hankering  after  a  quid  pro  quo  is  a  primary 
factor  in  the  Judaic  psychology.  Each  man,  they 
thought,  must  get  his  fair  share  of  good  and  of  evil. 
Those  that  suffered  on  earth  should  have  compensation 


2o6  TWEXTV   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

in  a  future  state,  while  those  who  were  happy  here  and 
made  others  suffer  shouKl  in  ihcir  turn  have  to  undergo 
pain  hereafter.  It  may  thus  be  said  that  it  was  between 
the  years  175  and  163,  that  is  to  say,  some  time 
during  the  reign  of  Epiphanes  Antiochus,  otherwise 
Antiochus  I\^,  that  the  world  saw  the  genesis  of  that 
terrible  idea  of  future  punishment  which  has  terrorised 
the  civilised  world  ever  since." 

"  Had  not  heaven,  the  idea  of  heaven,"  I  asked, 
"  its  genesis  simultaneously — that  grand  idea  of  future 
happiness  which  has  kept  the  poor  and  oppressed  so 
patient  and  submissive  ever  since  ?  " 

''  Yes,  simultaneously  that  idea  arose.  Future 
suffering  for  the  torturers,  Antiochus  and  his  crew  ;  and 
for  the  tortured,  the  persecuted  and  martyred  Jews, 
future  happiness.     A  squaring  of  accounts." 

"  Eternal  beatitude  for  these ;  for  those,  eternal 
pain." 

"  Not  a  bit  of  it.  The  Jews  could  not  conceive 
eternal  life  in  any  form  for  a  finite  being.  Eternity, 
in  their  belief,  was  alone  the  prerogative  of  Almighty 
God,  the  Eternal  Being.  Opinions  varied  as  to  the 
duration  of  the  beatitude  which  should  be  enjoyed  by 
those  who  had  suffered  on  earth.  Some  thought  that  it 
would  last  four  hundred  years ;  others  maintained  it 
would  be  for  a  thousand  years.  None  hoped  for  eternal 
beatitude." 

"  Then  in  this  respect  also,"  I  said,  "  humanity,  an 
inch  being  granted  to  it,  has  ended  by  taking  an  infinity 
of  ells  ? " 

"  As  humanity  will  do  under  all  circumstances. 
How  far  are  the  hopes  of  the  believer  of  to-day  from 
the  hopes  of  the  Jew  of  one  hundred  and  fifty  years 
before  Christ,   who  only  looked  for  seven  lifetimes  of 


THE    DEVELOPMENT   OF   THE    IDEA     207 

happiness !  Appetite  has  come  to  us  while  eating. 
None  to-day  would  be  satisfied  with  the  prospect 
of  a  thousand  years  of  beatitude.  All  expect  to  be 
happy  for  ever  and  ever.  In  the  nine  hundred  and 
ninety-ninth  year  all  would  revolt,  raise  barricades  in 
Paradise,  and  insist  on  a  renewal  a  perpdtuitd  of  the 
awarded  felicities." 

"  But,"  I  remarked,  "  the  promises  and  the  menaces 
of  the  Lord  Jesus  ?  " 

Renan  bowed  his  head.     Then  he  said  : 

"  They  were  a  continuation — a  development  of  the 
ideas  current  among  the  Maccabeans,  the  genesis  of 
which  I  have  exposed  to  you.  The  formulae  given  in 
the  Gospels  are  an  extension  of  similar  formulae  to  be 
found  in  such  works  as  The  Book  of  Enoch  and  The 
Assumption  of  Moses.  Christ's  menaces  were  a  consider- 
able development." 

"  Why  do  you  say  that,  niditre  ?  " 

*'  Because  the  original  idea  of  punishment  was  less 
a  state  of  suffering  than  one  of  complete  annihilation. 
The  wicked  man  was  to  be  crushed  out,  while  the  good 
man  was  to  enjoy  from  four  hundred  to  a  thousand  years  of 
felicity.  At  the  same  time  the  idea  of  annihilation  was  not 
generally  accepted.  Many  people  liked  the  idea  that 
others  would  be  in  a  state  of  suffering  in  the  after-life, 
so  that  their  own  state  of  felicity  might  be,  as  it  were, 
increased  by  the  contrast.  It  was  to  make  a  contrast 
possible,  for  the  sake  of  a  comparison." 

"Was  it  held  that  this  state  of  suffering  should  be 
eternal  ? " 

"  I  have  already  said  that  the  Jews,  from  whom  the 
Christians  have  inherited  their  beliefs,  could  not  conceive 
an  eternity  for  men,  believing  that  state  to  be  alone  the 
prerogative  of  the  Almighty.' 


2oS  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

"  And  whence  iirosc  the  idea  tliat  there  would  be 
burning  in  hell — fire  in  hell  ?  " 

"It  was  thought  that  the  pain  of  burning  was  the  most 
atrocious  pain  that  could  be  endured  by  the  body,  and 
so  it  was  applied  to  the  soul.  I  have  said  that  in  matters 
of  religion  none  should  be  astonished  at  the  utmost 
childishness  of  belief.  But  the  germ  idea  of  this  form 
of  punishment  may  be  found  in  the  sacred  Book  of 
Isaiah,  which  is  not  contained  in  the  Bible,  and  which 
was  written  during  the  time  of  the  Captivity.  And  the 
fire  and  the  worm  of  the  later  belief  were  doubtless 
inspired  by  recollections  of  the  worship  of  Moloch, 
before  whom  children  were  sacrificed  in  burning  braziers. 
The  Valley  of  Gehenna,  near  Jerusalem,  a  sort  of 
Montfaucon,  where  corpses  were  left  to  rot — 2^ pourrissoir 
— and  where  fires  burned  to  clear  the  pestiferous  air, 
did  also  suggest  the  idea  of  a  terrible  place  of  punish- 
ment, a  place  where 

Vermis  eorum  non  moritur  et  ignis  non  extinguitur." 

"  Why,"  I  asked,  "  was  hell  supposed  to  be  below 
the  surface  of  the  earth  ?  Surely  to  the  ignorant  the 
region  of  fire  is  where  the  lightning  is  ?  " 

'*  It  had  to  be  placed  somewhere.  Above,  in  the 
bright  azure  of  the  beautiful  skies,  was  naturally  the 
place  of  beatitude.  Nor  was  the  presence  of  subterranean 
fire  unknown,  for  the  volcanoes  were  proof  of  its 
existence.  For  contrast,  also,  heaven  above,  and  hell, 
consequently,  below." 

"  But  did  not  the  Romans  entertain  any  idea  of  a 
place  of  punishment  after  death  ?  " 

"  Not  the  cultured,  not  the  intelligent.  The  ignorant 
possibly  may  have  done  so.  To  the  cultured  the  stories  of 
Ixion,  Tantalus,  and  the  other  sufferers  appeared  as  they 


THE    BELIEF   OF   THE    ROMANS       209 

do  to  us — creations  of  poetical  minds.  Amongst  the  cul- 
tured, at  the  most,  existed  indifference  and  doubt.  What 
does  Tacitus  say  ?  '  Si,  ut  sapientibus  placet,  non  cum 
corpore  extinguantur  magnae  animae.'  'If,  as  it  pleases 
the  learned  to  say.'  ...  Is  not  that  an  immense  shrug  of 
the  shoulders  ?  Such  was  the  general  attitude  amongst 
Romans  who  thought.  The  vulgar  very  possibly  be- 
lieved in  Styx  and  Tartarus  and  the  tortures  that  the 
poets  spoke  about." 

"  But  amongst  other  peoples  ?" 

"  Yes,  there  were  the  Buddhists." 

"  Ah,  yes !  they  looked  forward  to  an  ultimate 
Nirvana." 

"  No,  only  the  cultured  Buddhists  did  that.  But 
the  ignorant,  the  vulgar,  the  general  had  an  idea  of  a 
place  of  future  punishment  of  which  we  know  many 
pictorial  representations  to  have  survived.  These 
pictures,  frescoes  mostly,  show  us  that  the  vulgar,  un- 
cultured Buddhists  believed  in  a  place  of  future  punish- 
ment which  very  closely  resembled  the  Inferno  described 
by  Dante.     You  remember  the  lines  : 

Quivi  sospiri,  pianti  ed  alti  guai 
Risonavan  per  I'aer  senza  stelle, 

Perch'io  al  cominciar  ne  lagrimai. 
Diverse  lingue,  orribili  favelle, 
Parole  di  dolore,  accenti  d'ira, 
Voci  alte,  e  fioche  e  suon  di  man  con  elle." 

"  Where  did  Dante  get  his  ideas  of  Inferno  from  ?" 
I  asked. 

"  They  were  the  current  ideas  of  his  time — the  ideas 
of  hell  which  were  current  in  the  thirteenth  century,  as 
is  shown  by  the  numerous  paintings  which  existed  con- 
temporaneously with  Dante  in  the  churches  in  Italy. 
And   now  let  me  say  that  almost  as  long  as   humanity 

14 


2IO  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

has  existed  there  h;is  been  entertained  the  hope  that  the 
wicked — that  is,  the  man  who  made  one  suffer — would 
eventually  be  served  out.  Man  has  ever  considered 
himself  a  beast  of  burden,  on  whose  back  the  wicked 
rains  down  blows  with  a  cudgel.  He  has  always  hoped 
that,  if  he  never  should  be  able  to  serve  the  wielder  of 
the  cudgel  out,  yet  somehow  or  somewhere  the  latter 
should  suffer  in  his  turn.  '  Un  jour  viendra  qui  tout 
paiera  '  is  the  expression  of  a  hope  which  is  almost  coeval 
with  mankind." 

"And  about  purgatory?" 

"  Traces  of  the  idea  of  a  middle  place  can  be  found 
in  the  writings  of  early  Christianity.  But  it  was  in  the 
Middle  Ages  that  the  belief  in  purgatory  became  general. 
An  espece  de  moyen  terine  was  wanted.  It  was 
found  useful  to  have  a  place  for  those  who  had  sinned 
moderately,  a  place  of  expiation  for  peccadilloes,  a  place 
for  those  who  could  not  be  damned  outright.  But  it  was 
chiefly  to  the  rapacity  of  the  Church  that  the  invention 
of  purgatory  may  be  ascribed.  It  was  a  speculation  on 
the  part  of  the  priests — an  excellent  speculation,  I  may 
add  ;  for  no  invention  of  human  ingenuity  has  brought 
in  more  money  than  this.  You  see,  a  soul  in  purgatory 
could  be  released  by  so  many  masses  at  so  much  a  mass. 
Gold  poured  into  the  coffers  of  the  Church — legacies, 
indulgences,  all  the  tricks. 

"  It  is  all  so  simple  and  all  so  obvious,"  he  added, 
"and  yet  people  appear  to  be  very  angry  with  me,  and 
assail  me  with  letters.  Not  that  these  letters  are  usually 
controversial.  No,  they  need  no  answer ;  they  merely 
make  statements.  I  cannot  tell  you  how  many  letters  I 
have  received  of  late  in  which  was  the  simple  assertion, 
'  There  is  a  heaven '  (//  y  a  wi  Paradis),  heavily 
underlined." 


THE    CHRISTIANITY   OF    RENAN      211 

Ernest  Renan  was,  of  course,  no  believer  in  the 
divinity  of  Christ  ;  but  he  loved  Him  and  followed  His 
laws  naturally,  without  any  hope  of  a  reward  hereafter. 
He  was  one  of  the  truest  Christians  that  I  have  ever 
met ;  but,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  it  has  been  my  general 
experience  in  life  that  the  best  and  worthiest  disciples  of 
Christ  are  more  often  to  be  found  among  those  who  do 
not  see  in  Christianity  more  than  a  philosophical  system. 
Ernest  Renan  was  the  simplest  of  men.  From  his 
universal  reputation  and  the  great  success  of  his  books 
he  derived  no  vainglorious  emotions.  The  praise  of 
the  humblest  gratified  him  as  a  tribute  of  which  he  was 
unworthy.  I  remember  telling  him  on  the  first  occasion 
on  which  we  met  that  his  Vie  de  J^sus  had  long  been 
with  me  a  livre  de  chevet.  He  really  was  pleased  at 
this  meagre  tribute  from  me.  "  You  are  very  kind  ;  you 
are  very  kind,  sir,"  he  kept  repeating,  and  he  looked 
gratified,  and  he  put  his  beautiful  little  white  hand  on 
mine  as  he  talked.  I  have  known  authors,  very  far 
removed  from  his  celebrity,  who  have  appeared  to  resent 
any  praise  of  their  books,  giving  one  the  impression  that 
they  held  that  no  words  could  adequately  convey  a 
description  of  the  merits  of  the  works. 

Renan  had  the  Christian  regard  for  the  humble,  for 
the  little  children  of  the  Scriptures.  He  respected 
poverty  ;  indeed,  he  lived  and  died  poor  himself,  although 
he  might  have  been  a  very  rich  man.  An  offer  was 
made  to  him  of  1,000,000  francs  if  he  would  give  a 
certain  complexion  to  the  history  of  the  Jews  not 
warranted  by  historical  fact.  He  naturally  refused  the 
bribe,  and  in  other  ways,  too,  he  showed  his  contempt 
for  money  and  possession.  When  he  died  he  was  so 
poor  that  the  nation  had  to  pension  his  widow. 

I  was  a  frequent  visitor  at  his  home.     He  lived  on 


212  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

the  second  floor  of  the  Kcolc  tie  France.  His  apartment 
looked  out  on  the  quadran<j^le  in  front  and  on  some 
gardens  at  the  back.  It  was  much  like  the  rooms  of 
a  married  don  at  Oxford.  I  often  thought  of  Charles 
Reade's  rooms  at  Magdalen  in  comparison.  The  place 
was  full  of  books.  The  small  ante-chamber  was  furnished 
with  bookcases.  I  remember  one  day,  when  he  had 
accompanied  me  to  the  door,  and  we  were  standing  in 
this  room,  our  conversation  turned  back  to  books.  We 
had  referred  some  time  previously  to  the  homo  unius 
libri,  and  Renan  had  described  this,  a  "  foolish  epigram, 
a  paradoxical  mot  d esprit.''  I  remarked  to  him  as  we 
looked  at  the  lono-  lines  of  books  on  the  walls  of  the 
entrance-room,  "  Well,  you,  maitre,  at  least  are  not  a 
man  of  one  book.  Here  is  the  Bible,  and  here  is  the 
History  of  the  Jews.  Then  here  is  a  Guizot,  and  here 
is  Mahaffys  Rajiibles  in  Greecey  and  here  the  Gi'eek 
Customs,  and  here   Haweis's   Thoughts  for  the   Ti77ies.'' 

He  said,  "  I  am  a  man  of  many  books.  I  don't 
think  that  the  scholar  can  be  surrounded  by  too  many 
books." 

I  once  heard  him  answer  that  very  foolish  question 
which  is  often  put  to  bookish  men,  "If  you  were  only 
to  be  allowed  one  book,  which  book  would  you  choose  ?  " 
I  heard  a  very  distinguished  man  once  answer  to  this 
question,  "  The  Book  of  Job,"  and  when  he  was  asked 
why,  he  said  :  "  To  learn  patience  when  worried  with 
foolish  questions."  Renan  was  much  too  gentle  to  say 
such  a  thing.  He  answered  that  it  was  difficult  to  reply 
to  such  a  question.  "  I  think,  however,"  he  said,  "  that 
I  should  choose  the  Holy  Bible,  which  in  every  sense 
is  the  Book  of  books.  I  have  heard  of  those  who,  in 
answer  to  your  question,  have  answered  that  they  would 
prefer  Homer.      It  is  a  matter  of  predilection  ;  but  even 


THE    BOOK   OF    BOOKS  213 

considered  as  poetry,  and  apart  from  all  other  points  of 
interest,  I  think  the  Bible  still  the  Book  of  books. 
And,  of  course,  as  the  historian  of  the  Jews,  the  Old 
Testament,  which  is  their  first  history,  is  indispensable 
to  me." 

Once  Renan  was  launched  on  a  subject,  he  could  go 
on  for  a  long  time.  The  mention  of  Homer  led  him  to 
discuss  the  question  of  the  authorship  of  the  Homeric 
epics.  He  declared  himself,  on  this  question,  one  of  the 
Separatists.  "  It  is,"  he  said,  "  for  me  a  collection  of 
ballads,  the  work  of  many  men,  not  of  one  man."  This 
brought  him  to  touch  on  the  Bacon-Shakespeare  dis- 
cussion, which  was  then  at  its  height,  owing  to  the 
alleged  discoveries  of  Ignatius  Donnelly,  and  on  this  he 
said  :  "  I  have  heard  of  the  controversy,  but  I  can  hardly 
venture  an  opinion,  as  I  have  not  studied  the  question. 
But,"  he  added,  "  I  am  well  acquainted  with  the  works  of 
Bacon,  and  have  a  profound  admiration  for  his  scholar- 
ship and  his  style." 

There  was  something  old-fashioned  and  provincial, 
and  at  the  same  time  intensely  homelike,  about  Renan's 
apartment  in  the  College  de  France,  which  delighted 
me  so  that  I  always  enjoyed  the  hours  that  I  spent 
there.  His  drawing-room  might  have  been  the  parlour 
of  a  remote  chateau  in  the  Vendee  two  centuries  gone 
by.  The  tapestries  were  at  least  that  age,  and  the 
portraits  which  hung  on  the  walls  were  certainly  of  the 
period  of  Louis  XIV.  in  his  dotage.  Some  of  the 
furniture  in  the  dining-room  reminded  one  of  a  Breton 
farmhouse.  There  were  used  those  quaint  old  salt- 
cellars of  Breton  crockery  which  female  figurines  hold 
up  with  outstretched  arms.  There  were  always  flowers 
in  profusion,  "the  luxury  of  the  poor,"  as  Renan  used 
to  say. 


214  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

His  study  \v;is  beyond  the  dininj^i'-room,  and 
there  it  was  that  I  first  met  liini  and  where  afterwards 
I  most  frequently  stayed  with  him.  He  was  always 
untidily  dressed,  and  his  hair  was  ever  rumpled.  I  have 
never  seen  Renan,  even  at  official  ceremonies,  with  his 
hair  tidy.  In  the  house  he  used  to  wear  slippers,  and 
glided  about  noiselessly.  And  this  was  by  no  means 
the  only  point  in  him  that  was  feline.  He  literally 
purred  when  he  talked  ;  or  rather,  I  should  say,  his 
voice,  which  was  most  pleasant  to  listen  to,  was  low 
and  had  that  purring  caress  which  seems  to  be  acquired 
by  Churchmen  from  long  practice  of  whispered  con- 
fidences in  boudoir  and  confessional.  And  he  was  sleek 
and  plump,  and  had  the  whitest  hands.  I  used  to 
compare  him  in  my  mind  to  some  courtier  abbe  of  the  days 
of  rapier  and  peruke,  some  priest  at  the  Palais  Royal 
under  Mazarin :  he  had  the  manners,  the  ■nialicieux 
look  in  the  eyes,  the  intelligence  writ  across  his  face. 

On  the  very  first  time  that  I  saw  him  his  bright- 
faced  little  Breton  bonne  took  me  right  into  his  study — 
a  rare  privilege,  I  afterwards  understood,  I  found  him 
writing  at  a  table  on  which  an  oil-lamp  shed  its  subdued 
light.  He  was  busy  correcting  some  proofs  of  a  history 
of  the  fourteenth  century.  He  seemed  literally  walled 
in  with  books.  The  very  steps  of  the  library  ladder 
were  covered  with  books  and  pamphlets.  The  floor 
was  littered  with  volumes.  There  was  not  a  chair 
unoccupied.  The  walls  were  covered,  devoured  with 
books.  Only  room  had  been  left  for  one  or  two  gloomy 
mediaeval  portraits  in  time-tarnished  frames.  On  the 
mantelpiece  to  the  left  of  Renan's  table  was  a  terra-cotta 
bust  of  him  by  Victor  le  Clere,  which  was  of  extra- 
ordinary resemblance.  He  was  always  pale.  I  remember 
that    that   evening,   as  he  turned   his   face  towards  me 


A    PORTRAIT   OF    RENAN  215 

under  the  lamp,  I  was  struck  with  its  pallor.  It  was  a 
white  presence  in  a  room  of  shadows.  I  thought  that 
he  looked  like  a  white  monk.  But  if  his  face  had 
monastic  pallor,  his  form  showed  no  monastic  asceticism, 
for  here  was  the  plump  and  comfortable  presence  of  the 
courtier  abbe  who  dines  well  and  lies  in  warm  beddings. 
He  often  used  to  complain  of  the  difficulties  which 
he  encountered  in  writing  his  History  of  the  Jews. 
"  The  documents  are  so  rare,"  he  used  to  say.  Yet 
he  always  told  me  how  he  enjoyed  the  work,  how  deeply 
interested  he  was  in  the  Jewish  people.  One  day  he 
said  to  me,  "  There  is  a  heavy  cloud  over  a  long  period 
of  their  history,  and  it  is  with  reason  that  the  first 
centuries  of  our  era  have  been  called  the  dark  ages." 

I  believe,  however,  that  it  was  these  very  difficulties 
which  fascinated  Renan  in  writing  his  History  of  the 
Jews.  I  once  heard  him  say  that  he  wished  he  had 
time  for  a  task  which  would  have  been  even  harder. 
"I  should  like,"  he  told  me,  "if  time  permitted  me, 
to  write  the  history  of  the  Greeks  after  the  fall  of 
the  Eastern  Roman  Empire.  It  is  a  subject  of  very 
great  interest.  But  what  a  colossal  undertaking  !  What 
researches  it  would  involve  !  For  on  no  point  of  history 
is  documentary  evidence  more  rare." 

I  only  once  saw  Renan  show  signs  of  impatience. 
A  red-haired  Englishman  who  stuttered,  and  who  was, 
I  believe,  a  baronet,  asked  him  what  he  thought 
of  the  theory  that  the  English  are  descended  from  the 
lost  tribes  of  Israel.  He  came  very  near  to  shrugging 
his  shoulders.  "  It  is,"  he  said,  "  perhaps  a  theory 
which  is  unworthy  of  investigation." 

On  one  occasion  he  almost  rebuked  me.  I  had 
been  speaking  of  the  Naturalists,  and  he  cried  out  : 
"  Nay,  monsieur,  you  must  not  speak  to  me  about  the 


2i6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Naturalists.  I  think  nothing  about  them.  That  it  is 
low,  tar  away,  out  of  sight,  beneath.  It  is  the  mud. 
It  is  a  jiity  lor  I'rench  hterature.  I  have  a  horror  for 
what  is  coarse.  At  Pompeii  all  that  w^as  coarse  was 
secreted  and  hidden  away.  It  is  a  pity  that  we  do  not 
do  the  same  in  these  days.  I  confess  that  I  cannot 
understand  how  the  P^rcnch,  so  lettered,  so  scholarly, 
and  so  full  of  taste,  can  tolerate  such  horrors  as  are 
the  modern  novels."  Nor  would  he  ever  allow  me  to 
talk  to  him  of  Guy  de  Maupassant. 

I  remember  being  at  Renan's  house  one  afternoon 
in  July,  1888,  when  Daudet's  L' Immortel  was  being 
discussed.  A  young  publisher  who  was  present  told 
us  that  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  almost  everybody  had 
read  the  tale  in  feuilleton  in  L Illustration ,  twenty 
thousand  copies  had  been  sold  in  two  days.  Hereupon 
Renan  said :  "  I  don't  see  how  a  novel  about  the 
Academy  can  have  public  interest.  The  Academy  has 
become  one  of  the  commonplaces  of  conversation.  One 
talks  about  it  in  society  just  as  one  talks  about  the 
weather — for  something  to  say.  As  to  these  intrigues, 
about  which  Daudet's  book,  I  hear,  tells  so  much,  they 
simply  don't  exist.  But  why  should  one  contradict  their 
existence  if  the  belief  in  them  amuses  some  part  of  the 
public  ?  Oh,  monsieur,  let  us  never  do  anything  to 
diminish  the  gaiety  of  nations  !  Perhaps  it  is  true  that 
the  merits  of  the  various  candidates  are  not  always 
weighed  as  they  should  be.  But  it  is  not  the  role  of 
the  Academy  to  classify  talents.  The  title  of  Aca- 
demician is  less  a  literary  than  a  social  honour." 

I  mentioned  to  Renan  that  a  few  days  previously  I 
had  driven  to  the  Institute  with  Ferdinand  de  Lesseps. 

"  Exactly,"  said  Renan.      "  There  is  a  case  in  point 
of  a  man  who  was  elected  to  the  Academy  not  for  his 


RENAiN   AND    DAUDET  217 

literary  merits — has  de  Lesseps  ever  written  anything  ? — 
but  because  he  was  a  distinguished  gentleman  whom 
we  wished  to  honour  and  whom  we  were  proud  to 
number  in  our  company.  It  was  my  privilege  to 
address  him  at  his  reception.  I  hope  that  Alphonse 
Daudet  had  no  wish  to  hurt  anybody's  feelings  in  the 
Academy,  because  if  he  had  he  has  failed  completely  in 
his  purpose.  His  book  is  being  completely  ignored 
amongst  us." 

He  added  after  a  while  :  "  I  am  sorry  to  hear  that 
Daudet  has  made  use  of  one  or  two  very  realistic 
expressions  in  this  new  book  of  his.  I  am  told  that  the 
great  word  of  Zola  and  the  Naturalists  is  there  in  all 
letters.  It  is  a  pity,  because  Daudet  has  refinement 
and  style,  and  he  should  not  stoop  to  such  things." 

I  repeated  this  to  Daudet  some  time  later,  and  I  do 
not  know  whether  Renan's  criticism  affected  him  or  not. 
I  only  know  that  in  subsequent  editions  of  L Immortel 
the  offending  passage  did  not  appear. 


CHAPTER  XV 

Louise  Michel — My  First  Sight  of  Her — A  Gathering  of  Anarchists — The 
Police  Spies— Ferry  and  Aubertin — A  Stolen  Interview — Louise  Michel's 
Appearance — Her  Noble  Character — My  last  Meeting  with  Her — Why 
She  Refused  Her  Blessing — A  Socialist  at  the  Elysee — The  Dress-Coat 
and  the  Scent — Jules  Jouy. 

IT  was  one  Sunday  evening  in  December,  1887,  that, 
after  leaving  Ernest  Renan's  rooms  at  the  College 
de  France,  I  first  came  to  know  a  woman  who,  although 
she  was  a  professed  Atheist,  was  indeed  a  true  Christian. 
I  speak  of  the  Red  Virgin,  Louise  Michel,  ex-Communarde 
and  pdtroleuse,  whose  big  heart  melted  for  the  sufferings 
of  the  poor. 

After  leaving  the  Rue  des  Ecoles,  I  was  crossing  the 
Boulevard  St.  Michel,  when  I  caught  sight  of  a  small  red 
poster,  affixed  to  one  of  the  trees,  announcing  a  meeting 
of  Social  Democrats  at  a  certain  well-known  tavern 
in  the  Rue  Montagne-Ste-Genevieve  at  eight  o'clock 
that  night.  The  presence  of  Louise  Michel  was  assured, 
and  all  citizens,  especially  all  students,  were  invited. 
The  entrance  fee  was  to  be  threepence.  In  those  days 
one  still  took  the  Social  Democrats  mi  s^ideux  as  a  party, 
and  as  for  me  I  was  anxious  to  meet  Louise,  of  whom 
I  had  heard  much  from  Henri  Rochefort.  I  may  say  at 
once  that  I  never  heard  anything  bad  about  Louise.  At 
the  worst  she  was  spoken  of  as  half-witted.      I  suppose 

to  many  such  entire  unselfishness  as  marked  this  poor 

218 


A   GATHERING   OF   ANARCHISTS       219 

woman's  conduct   all    through    her   miserable    life  must 
have  appeared  a  kind  of  insanity. 

At  eight  o'clock  I  entered  the  tavern  in  the  Rue 
Montagne-Ste-Genevieve,  one  of  the  oldest  and  most 
disreputable  streets  of  the  Maubert  Quarter.  It  was 
one  of  those  mediaeval  taverns  with  its  front  painted  a 
vivid  red  and  the  passers-by  in  the  street  protected  from 
the  roysterers  inside  it  by  stout  iron  bars  over  all  its 
windows.  In  those  days,  as  I  have  said,  we  took  the 
Social  Democrats  as  in  earnest;  we  believed  in  the  sincerity 
of  the  anarchists,  and  I  really  felt  it  rather  courageous  on 
my  part  to  march  through  the  bar-room,  where  a  number 
of  disreputable  people  were  drinking,  into  the  assembly 
room  behind.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  I  suppose  that  that 
place  was  one  of  the  safest  spots  in  Paris.  Everybody 
was  spying  on  the  actions  and  words  of  everybody  else, 
on  the  chance  of  seeing  or  hearing  something  which 
might  be  reported  at  the  police  headquarters  and  of 
earning  eighteenpence.  Years  afterwards,  when  I  got 
to  know  people  at  police  headquarters  and  once  asked 
to  see  my  own  dossier,  I  duly  found  it  recorded  that  I  had 
attended  the  meeting  at  the  Rue  Ste-Genevieve  on 
that  night,  and  that  I  had  shaken  hands  with  Louise. 
Every  foreign  correspondent  who  resides  in  Paris,  by  the 
way,  has  his  dossier  at  the  Prefecture. 

The  meeting- room  was  a  hall  of  moderate  size, 
evidently  constructed  for  dancing  purposes,  with  a 
gallery  on  one  side  and  a  platform  on  the  other.  On 
the  platform  was  a  cracked  piano,  on  which  a  citoyenne 
was  playing  the  Marseillaise,  The  walls  were  decorated 
with  grotesque  frescoes  illustrating  the  pleasures  of 
the  dance,  and  at  one  end  was  a  smoke-begrimed  bust 
of  the  Republic,  wearing  a  Phrygian  cap  of  red  worsted 
on  her  head  and  surmounted  by  two  red  flags.     A  little 


220  TWENTY   YFARS    IN    PARIS 

girl,  the  daughter  of  Citizen  Bois-Cervoise,  an  ardent 
Social  Democrat  in  those  days,  who  since,  for  all  that 
I  know,  may  have  become  a  sub-prefect,  was  moving 
about  the  room  collecting  for  the  miners  of  the  Anzin 
district,  who  were  then,  as  they  chronically  are,  on  strike 
and  starving.  The  meeting  was  composed  of  a  large 
number  of  students  and  of  people  whom  in  my  innocence 
in  those  days  I  took  for  earnest  citizens  of  a  Revolutionary 
tendency. 

There  was  no  sitting  accommodation  ;  one  stood 
about  on  tables  or  benches.  Just  then  there  was  some 
excitement  in  Paris  because  a  half-witted  youth  named 
Aubertin  had  shot  at  Jules  Ferry.  The  orator  who 
was  addressing  the  meeting  in  the  Rue  Montagne-Ste- 
Genevieve — a  citoyen  in  a  blouse  who  spoke  very 
violently,  and  made  frantic  play  with  his  hands,  as 
is  the  wont  of  Socialist  orators  all  the  world  over — 
expressed  his  strong  approval  of  Aubertin's  conduct, 
and  regretted  that  he  did  not  succeed  in  "  making  the 
affair"  of  the  Tonkinois,  which  was  Ferry's  nickname. 
He  hoped  that  there  were  plenty  of  men  ready  to  follow 
in  Aubertin's  footsteps. 

A  young  man,  elegantly  dressed,  who  looked  like 
a  student,  but  who  may  have  been  an  agent  provocateur, 
made  loud  objections  to  this  advice.  He  was  at  once 
surrounded  by  angry  citizens,  who  for  some  time  past 
had  been  fuming  at  the  sight  of  his  top-hat,  and  violently 
hustled  out  of  the  room.  I  might  have  given  the 
meeting  some  valuable  information  on  the  subject  of  the 
attack  on  Ferry.  A  day  or  two  previously  I  had  been 
to  Ferry's  apartment.  He  lived  on  the  fourth  f^oor  of 
some  house  in  the  Champs-Elysees  Quarter,  and  affected 
at  least  Republican  simplicity.  I  had  been  anxious  to 
know    whether   he  had  been    really   wounded,   whether 


A  STOLEN    INTERVIEW  221 

Aubertin  was  a  genuine  assassin,  or,  as  one  fancied,  a 
mere  tool  of  the  police,  and  whether,  as  Rochefort  had 
suggested,  the  pistol  had  indeed  been  loaded,  not  with 
slugs,  but  with  a  slug.  There  was  quite  a  procession 
of  us  going  up  the  stairs,  and  I  happened  to  be  walking 
just  behind  Bourgeois,  who  is  Minister  again  to-day, 
and  may  very  possibly  be  President  of  the  Republic 
next  year.  I  spoke  to  him  and  he  spoke  to  me,  and 
we  agreed  that  things  were  coming  to  a  dreadful  pass 
in   France. 

In  this  way,  being  in  earnest  conversation  with  an 
ex-Minister,  I  passed  the  footman  at  Ferry's  door 
without  being  challenged,  and,  following  close  upon 
Leon  Bourgeois's  heels,  walked  straight  into  the  presence 
of  Jules  Ferry,  who  was  parading  up  and  down  his 
drawing-room  haranguing  an  audience  of  female 
relatives.  We  had  been  given  to  understand  that  he 
was  dangerously  wounded,  and  was  lying  in  bed  with 
fever.  He  was  very  indignant  with  me  when  he  had 
ascertained  who  I  was,  and,  as  I  left  the  room,  I  saw  him 
expostulating  with  Bourgeois.  He  seemed  to  think  that 
it  was  the  latter  who  had  brought  me  in.  Rochefort 
was  highly  amused  when  that  evening  I  told  him  that  I 
had  seen  the  Tonkinois  under  the  circumstances  which 
I  have  described  ;  but  he  said,  "  Take  care  you  don't  get 
yourself  shot  one  of  these  days."  At  that  time  it  was 
usual  in  France  to  revile  Jules  Ferry  ;  but  I  think  that 
since  then  people  have  come  to  see  that  he  was  one  of 
the  few  Republican  Ministers  who  had  a  policy,  and  that 
he  was  most  abominably  treated  in  his  lifetime. 

Bois-Cervoise  followed  the  citizen  in  the  blouse,  and 
gave  us  a  rdchauffde  of  one  of  Rochefort's  articles.  Whilst 
he  was  talking  we  heard  a  commotion  at  the  back. 
"  It's  she."    "  No,  it's  not."     "  Yes,  I  tell  you,  cest  eUe!' 


222  rWI'XTV    VF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

Throui^h  the  open  door  I  s.iw  out  in  the  street  a  broken- 
down  old  Ciirt  or  van  drawn  by  a  white  horse.  The 
floor  of  this  van  was  littered  with  straw,  and  on  this  were 
placed  three  chairs.  This  one  recognised  as  the  usual 
equipage  of  the  citoycnne  Louise  Michel  when  "  doing 
political  turns  "  at  the  assembly  rooms  ;  and,  yes,  there 
she  was.  making  her  way  with  sidling  gait  through  the 
crowd  which  opened  for  her  to  pass.  It  was  the  first 
time  that  I  had  seen  her.  She  appeared  to  me  a  little, 
insignificant  woman,  ugly  of  face  as  it  is  possible  for  an 
old  woman  to  be,  tanned  of  skin  like  a  Beauce  peasant, 
with  knotted  fingers  and  dressed  in  rags.  She  did  not 
show  in  any  respect  in  her  outward  appearance  that  she 
had  noble  blood  in  her  veins.  As  a  matter  of  fact — and 
this  is  not  generally  known — Louise  Michel's  mother  was 
feinjue-de-chavibre  in  a  country  house,  which  used  to  be 
visited  by  the  best  families  in  the  district.  Louise  was  the 
daughter  of  a  very  distinguished  nobleman,  who  came  on 
visits  there.  In  her  life,  if  not  in  her  appearance,  she 
showed  her  blood.  In  London  once  I  heard  the  poor 
exiled  woman  spoken  of  with  enthusiasm  by  one  of  her 
neighbours  as  "  a  thorough  gentleman  ;  that's  what  she  is, 
this  'ere  Louise,"  and  that  is  exactly  what  she  was,  I  was 
much  impressed  by  the  welcome  that  the  crowd  in  that 
meeting-room  gave  her ;  they  treated  her  with  the 
reverence  shown  to  a  queen.  I  saw  one  woman  stoop 
and  catch  up  the  muddy  and  tattered  hem  of  Louise's 
robe  and  press  it  to  her  lips.  Every  man  uncovered  as 
she  passed  ;  some  bowed.  One  old  man  wept  with 
emotion  and  embraced  the  citoyenne.  The  poor  are  very 
full  of  love  and  reverence  for  those  who  really  try  to 
help  them. 

Louise  climbed  on  to  the  platform  and  said,  "  I  have 
only    two    minutes    to   spare."     But    that    is    what    she 


LOUISE    MICHEL'S   ORATORY         223 

always  used  to  say.  "  I  have  to  go  from  here  to  Mont- 
martre,  where  I  am  expected  to  speak."  In  those  days 
she  had  a  fine  loud  voice  and  was  of  facile  eloquence. 
Nor  did  she,  save  when  worked  up,  use  the  violent 
language  which  one  was  accustomed  to  hear  amongst  her 
fellow  politicians.  She  had  a  dreamy  way  of  talking  in 
abrupt  sentences,  not  unlike  the  phrases  of  Bart  Kennedy, 
with  long  and  absent-minded  pauses  between,  such  as 
Charles  Matthews  affects  when  addressing  the  jury.  She 
had  no  action  of  the  hands,  but  kept  them  usually  folded 
behind  her  back,  pathetically  like  a  schoolgirl  saying  her 
lessons. 

I  am  afraid  that  our  poor  Louise  spoke  arrant 
nonsense  that  evening.  There  was  considerable  noise 
and  disturbance  in  the  room,  for  Victor  Lisbonne,  the 
Communard,  had  arrived,  and  was  relating  his  experi- 
ences ;  but  Louise's  voice  dominated  all  the  uproar.  She 
made  violent  accusations — there  was  nothing  easier  at 
the  time — against  Grevy  and  Wilson,  and  said  that  they 
were  but  two  ordinary  specimens  of  the  bourgeoisie  whose 
one  object  in  life  was  to  grind  down  the  poor  and  "ex- 
ploit" them.  "You  call  this  a  change,  but  it  is  only 
Carnot  instead  of  Grevy.  The  system  remains  the  same  ; 
you  are  still  all  sheep  being  led  to  the  slaughter."  She 
then  referred  to  the  Chicago  anarchists,  and  expressed 
her  sympathies.  "  It  is  the  same  everywhere,"  she  cried, 
"  and  everywhere  the  Republic  is  a  gigantic  word  for 
laughter." 

She  then  turned  to  a  subject  which  was  her  favourite 
one,  and  which  she  used  to  drag  in  whenever  she  spoke. 
"  There  are  rumours  of  war  afloat,"  she  said,  "  and  it  is 
possible  that  in  a  few  weeks  France  will  have  some  other 
nation  by  the  hair.  Thousands  of  you  will  then  be  sent 
out  to  be  butchered — and  for  whom  ?     For  these  very 


224  TWENTY   YRARS    IN    PARIS 

bourgeois  who  in  peace  grind  you  down,  starve  you, 
work  you  to  tlic  bone,  rob  you.  Things  will  never  be 
as  they  should  be  until  each  conscript  throws  down  his 
arms  and  refuses  to  fight  for  a  Republic  which  is  the 
worst  of  tyrants." 

It  was  the  ordinary  speech,  but  it  was  most  enthu- 
siastically received,  and  as  the  draggled  woman  slid  off 
the  platform  the  whole  street  rang  with  cries  of  "  Vive 
Louise  !"  "  \'ive  Louise  Michel !  "  As  she  was  passing 
out  to  the  door,  I  stopped  her  and  talked  to  her,  and  we 
shook  hands.  I  certainly  did  not  think  that  a  subject  of 
sufficient  importance  to  be  reported  the  same  evening  to 
police  headquarters,  and  as  a  taxpayer  myself  I  trust 
that,  at  any  rate,  not  more  than  the  minimum  of  two 
francs  was  paid  to  the  spy  for  this  piece  of  information. 

I  saw  Louise  again,  sixteen  years  afterwards,  and 
for  the  last  time.  It  was  shortly  before  her  death. 
That  she  was  obviously  dying  then  served  to  heighten  my 
indignation  against  the  political  Barnums  who  for  the 
sake  of  notoriety  and  gain  dragged  this  poor  old  woman 
from  town  to  town  to  mumble  nonsense  on  public  plat- 
forms. It  was  an  abominable  thing  to  make  of  poor 
Louise  a  spectacle.  When  she  was  announced  to  speak 
at  the  theatre  of  Vernon  in  the  winter  of  1903,  I  deter- 
mined to  go  and  make  my  public  protest  there,  and  I 
found  that  a  number  of  my  fellow-citizens  were  of  my 
way  of  thinking.  A  young  buck-anarchist,  who  was, 
I  think,  the  impresario  of  the  pitiful  show,  referred  to 
our  protests  as  those  of  an  organised  opposition. 

In  the  theatre  cafe  during  an  entracte  in  this  tragical 
comedy  I  introduced  myself  to  him  as  the  "  organised 
opposition."  Poor  Louise  was  sitting  there,  and  I  re- 
minded her  of  her  first  meeting,  and,  strange  to  say,  she 
well  remembered  that  night  in   1887  ''^'^^  ^^^  discourse 


OUR   LAST    MEETING  225 

in  the  Rue  Montagne-Ste-Genevieve.  She  was  miser- 
ably clad  for  a  woman  who  suffered  from  the  chest.  On 
her  head  she  had  one  of  those  cheap  straw  hats  which 
are  sold  for  a  few  pence  in  the  London  shops.  Her 
boots  gaped  at  the  toes.  It  was  midwinter.  They  were 
taking  her  all  over  France  to  coin  her  notoriety  into 
money.  All  that  was  expected  of  her  was  to  come  upcm 
the  stage  and  show  herself  She  tried  to  speak — that 
night  at  Vernon  she  had  tried  to  speak — but  her  voice 
had  left  her  and  her  thoughts  were  all  astray.  Of  the  old 
manner  there  remained  only  her  pathetic  attitude  as  of 
a  schoolgirl  saying  her  lessons.  She  looked,  as  I  sat 
next  to  her  in  that  cafe  at  Vernon,  so  old,  so  ugly,  so 
forlorn,  so  wretched,  and  withal  had  such  a  look  of  kind- 
ness in  her  weary  eyes  and  saddest  smile,  that  before 
leaving  her  I  said,  "  Louise,  give  me  thy  blessing,"  for 
she  really  seemed  to  me  to  be  an  angel.  She  shook  her 
head  and  said,  ''Mais  non,  mon gar^on,  there  is  nothing 
in  that.  You  must  not  believe  in  things  like  that.  They 
don't  exist."  She  died  an  Atheist,  as  she  had  lived,  and 
withal  one  of  the  truest  followers  of  Christ  that  I  have 
ever  met. 

Maxime  Lisbonne,  the  professional  anarchist,  was  in 
great  form  at  Louise's  meeting  that  night  in  the  Rue 
Montagne-Ste-Genevieve.  On  arriving  there  he  was 
violently  attacked  by  some  fellow-members  of  the  Social- 
istic Club,  Les  Egaux,  because  he  had  been  present  at 
one  of  President  Carnot's  receptions  at  the  Elysee. 
'•  The  gilded  halls  of  the  rich  bourgeoisie  are  not  for 
the  members  of  Les  Egaux,"  was  what  was  said  to  him. 
I  heard  the  fat  ex-Communard's  explanation.  "  Citizens," 
he  said,  "  I  have  been  to  see  the  President  of  the  Re- 
public, and  I  can  assure  you  that  he  receives  people  very 
well.     Why  did  I  go  ?     Well,  I'll  tell  you,  because  I  had 

15 


226  TWI-NTV    VI-ARS    IN    PARIS 

a  dress-coat.  Where  did  I  get  a  dress-coat  from?  Well, 
it  was  part  of  my  old  acting  wardrobe.  I  used  to  wear 
it  when  playing  in  Thirty  Years  ;  or,  A  Gaifibiers  Life. 
I  found  it  the  other  day.  It  was  very  much  spotted,  and 
so  I  had  to  clean  it  with  benzine.  It  smelled  very  strongly 
of  this,  and  I  heard  one  swell  remark  at  the  buffet  that 
it  was  just  like  a  revolutionary  to  scent  himself  with 
petroleum.' 

Lisbonne  managed  to  make  the  members  of  his  club 
laugh,  and  followed  up  his  advantage  by  offering  to  lend 
the  dress-coat  to  each  of  them  in  turn,  so  as  to  enable 
them  to  taste  the  Elysee  champagne. 

Maxime  Lisbonne  was  the  professional  Communard 
who  opened  that  famous  tavern,  "  Le  Bagne,"  where  the 
waiters  were  dressed  as  convicts  and  the  rooms  were 
decorated  like  prison  w-ards.  It  was  one  of  the  first  of 
the  many  artistic  brasseries,  so  called,  which  had  for 
some  years  so  much  success  in  Paris.  He  was  always 
suspected  of  being  aic  wieiix  with  the  police,  but  that  is 
a  reputation  which  is  enjoyed  by  every  one  of  the  Parisian 
anarchist  party  posing  as  such. 

Very  shortly  after  my  introduction  to  Louise  Michel, 
I  was  at  the  Intransigeant  office  one  day,  when  Rochefort 
showed  me  a  bullet  which  had  been  fired  at  her  at 
Havre,  where  she  had  been  speaking.  Rochefort  pointed 
out  to  me  that  a  cross  had  been  cut  on  the  bullet,  and 
that,  he  said,  showed  that  the  man  Lucas,  the  would-be 
murderer,  was  sane  enough  when  he  tried  to  kill  the 
poor  woman.  "  It's  an  old  superstition  in  Brittany,"  he 
said,  "  that  if  this  precaution  be  not  taken,  the  shot  will 
recoil  on  the  murderer."  He  told  me  that  Louise  had 
been  badly  wounded,  but  that  she  refused  to  charge  the 
assassin. 

I  had  asked  Jules  Jouy  to  dine  with  me  that  night — 


JULES   JOUY,    THE    CHANSONNIER     227 

Jules  Jouy  of  the  Chat  Noir  ;  but  we  were  so  anxious 
about  Louise  Michel  that  he  insisted  on  our  going  to 
visit  her  before  we  sat  down  to  dinner.  So  we  drove 
out  together  to  Levallois-Perret,  where  she  lived.  She 
occupied  two  miserable  rooms  on  the  fifth  floor  of  a 
house  in  the  Rue  Victor  Hugo,  which  were  filled  with 
cats  and  dogs  and  birds.  She  seemed  to  have  there 
a  big  menagerie  of  strayed  animals.  I  could  not  get 
her  to  tell  me  anything  about  her  wound.  She  said  that 
it  was  nothing — "  Ce  n'est  rien  " — though  we  could  see 
that  she  was  ill  and  that  she  had  lost  much  blood. 

Jouy,  who  was  a  political  writer  on  Le  Cri  diL  Peuple^ 
besides  being  a  writer  of  songs,  told  her  that  in  her  state 
she  ought  not  to  have  come  on  to  Paris  ;  she  ought  to 
have  remained  at  Havre. 

"  Eh  bien,"  said  Louise,  laughing,  "  that  would  have 
been  a  fine  thing  to  do !  And  what  about  my  animals 
who  were  locked  up  here  ?  Who  would  have  attended 
to  them.?" 

Poor  Jouy !  Although  he  has  now  been  dead  many 
years,  he  is  still  remembered  in  Paris,  and  his  songs  are 
still  sung.  I  n  the  horrible,  the  genre  macabre,  he  has  had 
no  rival.  His  "  Gamahut,  ecoutez-moi  done,"  supposed 
to  be  addressed  to  the  murderer  Gamahut  by  the 
executioner,  moves  the  most  callous  ;  but  it  is  perhaps 
his  satirical  song  about  the  Paris  sergents-de-ville  that  is 
the  best-remembered  of  Jouy's  works  : 

Quand  les  sergents  s'en  vont  par  deux, 
C'est  qu'ils  ont  \  causer  entre  eux. 

He  was  the  most  popular  of  the  Chat  Noir  chansonniers, 
and  earned  handsome  fees  as  a  society  entertainer.  I 
have  frequently  seen  him  dans  le  vionde,  and  he  often 
used  to  draw  me  aside  and  whisper  to  me  the  amount  of 


228  TWF.XTV   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

the  cachet  ihat  \\v  was  to  receive.  He  confided  in  me 
once  that  he  was  saviiijj^  all  his  money  in  order  to  buy 
a  small  farm  in  the  country,  and  he  showed  me  the  plans 
of  the  house.  He  exi)ected  to  be  able  to  retire  in  about 
ten  years.  But  he  realised  too  strongly  the  deep  emotions 
that  he  used  to  depict,  and  that,  together  with  the 
irregular  life  and  the  late  hours  made  a  victim  of  poor 
Jules  Jouy.     He  went  like  Maupassant,  at  an  earlier  age. 

The  last  time  I  saw  him  was  at  a  double  execution. 
We  had  met  the  night  before  at  the  house  of  Monsieur 
Thors,  the  President  of  the  Banque  Hollandaise,  where 
he  had  been  helping  to  entertain  the  guests,  and  towards 
midnight  he  told  me  that  he  had  heard  that  the  next 
morning  the  three  murderers,  Sellier,  Allorto,  and 
Mecrant,  were  to  be  guillotined.  He  insisted  on  my 
accompanying  him  ;  he  said  that  a  triple  execution  was 
not  a  sight  to  be  missed.  It  was  in  vain  that  I  told  him 
that  I  had  already  seen  a  triple  execution,  at  which  one 
of  the  sufferers  w^is  a  woman.  He  would  have  me  go, 
and  so  we  went  off  in  evening  dress  to  the  dismal  Place 
de  la  Roquette. 

I  think  Jouy  must  have  been  disappointed  that  night, 
for  President  Carnot  had  reprieved  one  of  the  murderers 
— the  worst  of  the  batch,  by  the  way  ;  and  it  was  also  at 
this  execution  that  was  first  abolished  the  horrible  custom 
of  making  the  guiltier  accomplice  look  on  at  the  execution 
of  the  other.  Such  as  it  was,  however,  the  spectacle 
was  powerful  enough  to  cause  two  strong  men  to  faint. 
One  was  one  of  the  soldiers  on  duty  ;  the  other  was 
young  Isabey,  the  son  of  the  painter.  He  was  standing 
just  behind  me,  and  I  helped  to  carry  him  out  of  the 
crowd.  I  was  much  impressed  by  the  sight,  and,  on 
reaching  home,  I  wrote  my  impressions  in  the  following 
terms  : 


PLACE    DE    LA   ROQUETTE  229 

"  I  think  that  executions  should  not  be  pubHc.  On 
Saturday  morning,  as  day  dawned  on  the  Place  de  la 
Roquette,  I  saw  between  the  uprights  of  the  guillotine 
the  face  of  a  little  girl  watching  the  scene  from  the  attic 
window  of  a  neighbouring  house.  Later  on  all  the 
windows  in  this  house  were  occupied,  mostly  by  women 
and  children.  There  were  at  least  a  thousand  of  us  in 
the  inner  circle,  and  there  were  many  thousands  outside. 
These  sang  all  through  the  night.  We,  for  our  part, 
were  boisterous  and  flippant.  I  was  within  twenty  feet 
of  the  guillotine,  and  but  two  feet  from  the  passage 
down  which  the  condemned  men  passed. 

"  The  violet  lividness  of  Allorto,  the  yellow  hideous- 
ness  of  Sellier,  and  the  heart-rending  essaying  of  each 
to  grin  and  look  brave,  in  spite  of  trembling  limbs,  were 
what  I  wish  never  to  have  seen  and  will  not  presently 
forget.  I  cannot  say  that  of  either  butchery  I  saw  more 
than  the  preliminary  scuffle  in  the  case  of  each.  I  had 
my  eyes  closed,  and  wish  that  I  might  have  been  deaf 
also,  for  the  sound  of  the  crash  of  the  knife  is  now  at  all 
times  in  my  ears.  Every  detail  that  one  took  in  through- 
out that  long  and  sinister  vigil  was  repulsive  beyond 
description  :  the  general  indifference,  the  current 
pleasantries,  the  abjectness  of  Him  of  Paris  as  com- 
placently he  rubs  and  rubs  his  hands,  the  briskness  of 
his  valetaille,  the  horses  tossing  their  nose-bags,  the 
humble  besom  propped  against  the  van  (which  might 
have  been  a  respectable  besom  and  swept  a  vestry),  the 
yawning  basket,  and  the  horn  lanterns  here  and  there. 
As  for  the  guillotine,  it  is  a  pretty  and  by  no  means  a 
sinister  object. 

"  I  loved  the  two  priests  who  were  with  them  at  the 
last.  One  was  young,  tall,  and  fair,  and  had  the  presence 
of  a  saint  ;    the  other  was  short  and   comfortable,  and 


230  TWENTY  YEARS   IN    PARIS 

it  was  he  who  suffered  most ;  and  when  he  had  kissed  his 
poor  son  on  cither  cheek,  and  for  the  last  time  had  raised 
his  crucifix  aloft,  he  broke  down  and  cried  like  a  little 
child.  Those  who.  quand  mcmc,  attack  the  Church  and 
are  esprits  forts,  should  watch  her  ministers  on  such 
occasions, 

"  I  will  not  speak  of  the  after-scenes,  when  the 
guillotine  was  down  and  away,  and  the  outer  rabble 
was  let  in,  and  came  tearing  down  like  yelping  hyzenas 
to  where  it  had  been,  and  sought  and  sought  for  the 
smallest  fleck  of  blood.  I  try  only  to  remember  the 
pallor  of  the  sanctified  and  noble  youth  and  the  tears 
of  the  old  man.  They  were  what  alone  is  human  in  the 
terrible  night  that  I  have  passed." 

For  a  great  variety  of  purposes — so  it  occurred  to 
me  that  night — humanity  can  be  roughly  divided  up 
into  two  classes,  those  who  turn  yellowish  green  under 
extreme  terror  and  those  who  go  purple.  It  is  the  latter 
who  are  the  best  companions. 

Both  Jouy  and  I  were  much  amused,  when  day 
broke,  to  notice  in  the  very  forefront  of  the  spectators  on 
the  other  side  of  the  guillotine  a  ragged  negro,  who  wore 
a  comical  white  hat  and  who  was  barefooted — amused 
because  the  police  investigations  as  to  one's  right  to  pass 
into  the  enclosure  had  been  particularly  rigorous  that 
night.  The  sons  of  Ham  are  in  their  way  quite  as 
ubiquitous,  that  is  to  say  they  have  quite  as  much  the 
capacity  for  pushing  themselves  in  everywhere,  as  the 
sons  of  Sem. 

Jouy  seemed  to  enjoy  the  horrible  sight.  Morbidity 
was  in  great  demand  in  Paris  in  those  days,  and  he 
could  draw  inspiration  for  successful  songs  and  mono- 
logues on  the  Place  de  la  Roquette.  I  felt  as  disgusted 
as  I  always  have  done  when  I  have  been  present  at  the 


PLACE    DE    LA   ROOUETTE  231 

legal  slaying  of  human  beings.  On  that  occasion  two 
things  occurred  to  render  the  experience  particularly 
revolting  to  me.  The  first  of  these  was  that  just  before 
they  flung  Allorto  on  to  the  plank,  his  eyes,  wandering 
round  the  crowd  in  wild  supplication,  caught  mine.  I 
felt  as  if  a  knife  had  been  driven  into  my  face,  as  help- 
lessly, hopelessly  I  had  to  turn  my  head  away,  impotent 
to  answer  that  terrible  appeal. 

Later  on,  as  the  guillotine  was  being  taken  down  and 
the  place  cleaned,  I  was  standing  with  Jouy  by  the  side 
of  a  water-plug  in  the  pavement,  when  a  man  in  a  blue 
blouse,  with  characteristic  stains  on  it,  laid  his  hand  on 
my  arm,  asking  me  to  move  out  of  the  way.  I  noticed 
that  the  hand  was  maculated,  and  I  next  noticed  that  the 
man  was  carrying  a  bucket  in  which  there  was  a  sponge. 
I  gave  a  shout  of  indignation  :  "  Canaille,  how  dare  you 
touch  me!  "  Jouy  pulled  me  away,  and  told  me  that  I 
ran  a  considerable  risk.  Outrages  to  a  hangman's  valet 
would  be  most  severely  punished  by  the  court. 

I  was  out  of  France  when  poor  Louise  died,  or 
else  I  would  have  hurried  to  her  bedside  to  pay  a  last 
tribute  to  a  poor  woman  who,  to  my  thinking  at  least, 
had  much  in  her  both  of  martyr  and  saint.  They  were 
mostly  unbelievers  with  her  when  she  passed  away ;  but 
they  said  of  her  that  she  died  like  an  angel,  and  that 
her  face  after  death  had  the  repose  of  a  sleeping  child. 
Well,  she  would  feel,  as  she  was  drawing  her  last  breath, 
that,  as  far  as  her  poor  strength  had  allowed  of,  she  had 
done  all  that  she  could  to  help  the  wretched.  She  had 
risked  her  life  in  their  cause  ;  in  their  cause  she  had 
forfeited  her  liberty  ;  she  had  sacrificed  for  them  every- 
thing that  a  woman  holds  dear  ;  she  had  hungered  and 
had  walked  ragged  that  others  might  have  their  needs. 
"Si  ut  sapientibus  .  .  ."  there   should    be   a   crown  of 


232  TWI-XTV    VKARS    IN    PARIS 

j^lory  for    Louise    Michel.     William   Blake  would  come 
to  meet  her  like  a  sister  in  the  Elysian  fields. 

The  de.ith-bed  of  an  old  woman  which  I  do  not  like 
to  remember  is  one  that  I  visited  not  long  after  I  was 
with  jouy  for  the  last  time.  This  was  the  garret  in  the 
Rue  Lepelletier,  where  Cora  Pearl  lay.  Cora  had  been 
a  very  notorious  woman  in  years  gone  by,  and  towards 
the  end  of  the  Empire  and  in  the  early  days  of  the 
Republic  she  had  amazed  the  world  with  her  luxury  and 
extravagance.  I  used  to  see  her  in  her  entire  decadence, 
and  it  pained  an  English  heart  to  see  a  countrywoman 
of  his  so  degraded.  One  understands  what  is  meant  by 
the  feeling  of  national  honour  who  sees  his  countrywomen 
trafficking  in  their  shame  abroad. 

Cora  Pearl  was  so  poor  when  she  died  that  it  was  to 
the  concierge  s  charity  that  her  bier  owed  the  two  tapers 
which  burned  by  her  bedside  as  she  lay  in  state  in  that 
garret-room,  a  spectacle  for  moralists.  There  were  no 
flowers  brought  to  be  laid  upon  her  coffin.  In  the  old 
days,  one  gala  night  in  midwinter,  a  Russian  Grand 
Duke  had  carpeted  the  floor  of  her  vast  apartment  with 
violets,  purchased  at  their  weight  in  banknotes. 

I  cannot  say  that  Cora's  face  can  have  afforded  much 
satisfaction  to  the  moralists.  It  was  well  preserved,  and 
her  expression  was  one  of  contentment  rather  than  of 
remorse  or  distress.  Indeed,  one  notices  this  cynical 
and  mute  exultation  on  most  faces  of  dead  sinners. 
One  need  but  stroll  into  the  Morgfue  to  convince  oneself 
that  death  would  seem  to  the  majority  of  people  to 
bring  relief  and  rest.  It  is  true  that  Cora  died  amidst 
bourgeois  surroundings  such  as  would  appeal  to  her 
middle-class  instincts.  She  was  more  favoured  by  fate 
than  the  old  lionne  of  Louis  Philippe's  days,  who  quite 
recently  was  arrested  in  the  Bois  de  Vincennes,  a  Phryne 


"UNE   GRANDE    AMOUREUSE  "         233 

to  the  rag-pickers  ;  or  that  splendid  courtesan  of  the 
Third  Empire  who  died  in  a  garret  much  as  Gervaise 
died  in  her  hole  under  the  staircase. 

This  woman  was  destitute  of  everything.  Her  only- 
possession  was  a  trunk  which  was  filled  with  letters  from 
her  former  admirers.  All  her  love-letters,  extending 
over  the  entire  period  of  her  imperial  days,  were  there. 
Here  were  the  billets-doux  of  the  greatest  men  in  the 
State — the  very  greatest  was  abundantly  represented. 
She  used  to  sit  on  the  box — for  she  had  no  other  furni- 
ture— and  read  her  letters  by  the  light  which  came  through 
a  hole  in  the  roof.  When  they  found  her  dead,  she  was 
lying  with  her  head  on  her  treasure-box.  Had  she 
cared  to  traffic  in  these  letters,  there  was  at  least  a 
comfortable  living-  assured.  The  blackmailers  of  Paris 
would  have  given  thousands  of  pounds  for  these  docu- 
ments. The  Royal  autographs  would  have  been  held 
priceless  by  collectors.  But  to  this  grande  amoureuse 
the  thought  never  came  to  separate  herself  from  what 
were  the  proofs  of  the  triumphs  of  her  beauty.  These 
letters  were  more  to  her  than  food  or  clothes  or  a  decent 
shelter.     "  Ronsard  m'aimoit  lorsque  j'etais  belle." 

I  am  afraid  that  Cora  made  money  of  every  scrap 
of  compromising  writing  that  remained  in  her  possession 
after  her  ddchdance.  Of  worldly  goods  she  left  no  more, 
as  the  concierge  in  the  Rue  Lepelletier  told  me,  than 
one  could  wrap  up  in  a  pocket-handkerchief  7'hey 
included  a  portrait  of  Queen  Victoria  and  a  family  Bible. 
She  had  based  hopes  on  the  proceeds  of  her  Memoirs, 
which  were  published  some  years  before  her  death  ;  but 
the  police  had  spoiled  this  venture  from  a  financial  point 
of  view.  They  had  warned  her  that  no  extortion  might 
be  practised  in  connection  with  her  souvenirs,  and  had 
threatened,  in  case  she  gave  any  trouble,  to  expel  her 


234  TWENTY   YI'.ARS    IN    PARIS 

the  country,  as  ihry  li.ul  dour  afuM-  VDiing  Duval,  of  the 
Houillons  Duval.  attcnii)tcil  suicide,  and  suggested  an 
incident,  to  be  made  use  of  in  Nana,  to  Zola.  And  Cora 
knew  that  if  she  returned  to  England  she  would  have 
the  choice  there  between  starvation  and  the  workhouse. 
In  Paris  some  glamour  still  clung  to  her  name,  and 
there  were  amongst  the  more  foolish  of  theyt7^//^.s\-r^  dorde 
a  certain  number  who  were  proud  to  be  seen  giving  an 
arm  to  a  woman  for  whose  favours  kings  at  one  time 
had  striven,  or,  what  answered  Cora's  purpose  just  as 
well,  were  supposed  to  have  striven. 

The  concierge  of  the  house  where  she  died  made 
quite  a  good  thing  by  showing  the  body  to  the  curious, 
and  the  general  remark  was  that  it  was  surprising  that 
a  woman  with  such  ugly  features  could  ever  have  inspired 
such  passions  as  had  been  attributed  to  the  admirers  of 
Cora  Pearl.  The  fact  is,  that  beyond  a  great  abundance 
of  rutilant  hair,  and  a  skin  of  exquisite  whiteness  and 
delicacy,  Cora  Pearl  was  in  no  sense  of  the  word  a  pretty 
woman.  But  it  appears  that  she  was  wonderfully  made. 
It  was  after  her  bust  was  exhibited  at  the  Salon — so  she 
tells  us  in  her  Memoirs — that  her  physique  became  the 
talk  of  Paris.  She  is  still  spoken  of  amongst  sculptors 
as  the  most  divinely  formed  of  women  ;  and  there  is 
possibly  some  satisfaction  in  the  fact  that  in  a  city  where 
the  popular  idea  is  that  Englishwomen  are  always  by 
Nature  most  grudgingly  endowed,  the  daughter  of  an 
English  stable-lad  had  plastic  charms  that  maddened  a 
generation  of  foreign  princes  and  potentates. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

The  Captains  and  the  Kings— As  Subjects  for  Journalism—"  Carnot  at  the 
Elysee"  —  A  Geographical  Hotel  — Dom  Francis  and  his  Dogs  — 
"Envoyez  Schneider"— Dom  Pedro  of  Brazil — A  Night  Out  with  a 
King— Alexander  of  Servia — Leopold  of  Belgium — Oscar  of  Sweden — 
Macmahon  in  the  Lock-up  —  Carnot  and  the  Kangaroo  —  Adrien 
Marie  —  Queen  Victoria's  Kindness  —  Prince  Dhuleep  Singh  —  The 
Duchesse  d'Uzes — General  Boulanger. 

PRINCES  and  potentates!  The  concluding  words 
of  the  last  chapter  remind  me  that  it  is  usual  in 
writing  memoirs  to  give  prominence  of  description  to 
such  intercourse  as  the  writer  may  have  had  with  the 
rulers  of  men.  If  I  have  digressed  from  the  path  traced 
for  me  by  so  many  distinguished  predecessors,  it  is  not, 
let  me  hasten  to  affirm,  from  a  democratic  and  knavish 
disesteem  of  the  captains  and  the  kings,  but  because  I 
have  always  attached  very  much  more  importance  to 
those  who  have  done  great  things  than  to  those  who 
merely  are  great  by  pomp  of  circumstance.  I  will  add 
that  personally  I  cannot  detect  much  interest  in  those 
narratives  of  conversations  in  which,  of  the  two  inter- 
locutors, the  one  whose  words  one  cares  little  to  hear 
is  voluble  and  diffuse,  whilst  the  other,  whose  remarks 
might  really  be  informing,  is  stertorous  and  monosyllabic. 
I  protest  that  I  find  little  entertainment  in  reading  of  the 

things  that  Mr.  X or  Mr.  Y said  to  the  King  of 

;  and  kings  being  what  they  are,  and  tongue-tied  as 

they  are,  we  know  that  we  shall  look  in  vain  for  topics 

235 


236  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

of  interest  in  the  remarks  made  by  them  to  Mr,  X 

or  Mr.  V . 

1  am  supposing  Mr.  X or  Mr.  Y to  be  faithful 

chroniclers  \vho  avoid  embellishment  and  practise  no 
deception,  and  not  of  that  too  common  type  of  gazetteer 
who,  knowing  that  the  kings  will  not  condescend  to  repu- 
diate any  words  which  he  may  attribute  to  them,  allows 
his  clumsy  fancy  to  play  for  his  own  glorification  and  the 
bamboozlement  of  his  readers.  And  it  is  astonishing 
with  what  a  small  expenditure  of  imaginative  forces  the 
writer  who  describes  fictitious  personal  relationships  with 
kings  and  princes  can  command  a  public.  I  have  at 
present  in  my  mind  at  least  three  publicists  of  both  sexes 
whose  names  are  very  well  known,  and  who  earn  almost 
their  entire  income  by  inventing  stories  about  members 
of  ruling  dynasties  whose  acquaintance  and  even  friend- 
ship they  allege  they  enjoy.  A  few  back  numbers  of 
the  Alma7iach  de  Gotha,  a  red  book  or  two,  and  a 
shameless  capacity  for  telling  untruths  are  their  entire 
stock-in-trade. 

In  America  the  valuelessness  of  an  "  interview  "  with 
a  royal  personage  is  recognised  by  editors  and  corre- 
spondents alike.  Even  were  the  interview  genuine,  no 
rival  editor  would  believe  it  to  be  so,  and  consequently 
all  the  charm  of  having  secured  a  "beat"  over — that  is 
to  say,  of  having  beaten — a  competitor  is  wanting.  This 
being  so,  entire  freedom  is  given  to  the  European 
correspondent  to  invent  interviews  between  himself,  as 
correspondent  of  such-and-such  a  paper,  and  the  monarchs 
or  rulers  of  the  country  in  which  his  journalistic  operations 
may  be  carried  on.  Indeed,  it  is  tacitly  understood  that 
he  shall  "  fake  "  such  interviews  whenever  necessary.  I 
remember  an  American  correspondent  who  lived  in  Paris 
who  professed  to  have  a  keen  sense  of  honour  and  of  truth, 


"CARNOT   AT   THE    ELYS^E  "  237 

and  to  object  to  barefaced  lying.  The  editors  of  the 
paper  which  he  represented  were  very  fond  of  ordering 
him  to  interview  the  President  of  the  RepubHc  on  all 
kinds  of  absurd  questions.  It  was,  of  course,  quite 
impossible  for  him  to  obtain  audience  of  the  President 
under  any  circumstances,  and  even  had  an  audience  been 
granted  as  an  exceptional  favour,  nothing  like  an  "  inter- 
view "  would  have  been  tolerated.  My  friend  had  a 
strong  objection  to  barefaced  "  faking,"  and  in  the  follow- 
ing manner  was  able  to  comply  with  the  absurd  requests 
of  his  employers  without  sacrificing  his  principles. 

"  Sometimes,  towards  the  evening,"  he  told  me,  ex- 
plaining his  difficulties  and  his  method  of  getting  out  of 
them,  "I'll  get  a  cable  from  New  York,  saying,  Cleveland's 
been  seen  walking  arm-in-arm  with  a  buck-nigger,  and  I'm 
to  find  out  what  Carnot  thinks  of  the  situation.  They 
expect  me  to  go  to  the  Elysee  and  knock  up  the  Pre- 
sident and  just  have  a  friendly  chat.  And  in  that  paper 
they  have  to  get  what  they  expect,  or  you  get  fired.  Of 
course,  I  could  just  sit  down  and  write  off  the  cable  out 
of  my  head,  but  that  don't  suit  my  principles.  I  carry 
on  my  newspaper  work  on  the  George  Washington 
system,  and  don't  tell  more  lies  than  can  be  helped.  So 
I  have  routed  out  a  marc  hand  de  vins  fellow  called  Carnot, 
who  lives  out  Boulevard  Voltaire  way,  and  when  I  get 
one  of  these  damn-fool  cables  from  the  news-editor,  why, 
I  just  take  a  cab  and  drive  to  old  Carnot's  gin  mill,  on  the 
Boulevard  Voltaire,  by  way  of  the  Elysee  Montmartre, 
set  up  drinks  on  old  Carnot's  zinc  counter,  and  ask  him 
what  he  thinks  about  Cleveland's  walking  arm-in-arm 
with  buck-niggers,  or  whatever  confounded  nonsense 
they  want  to  know  about.  My  Carnot's  got  just  as  sensible 
a  head  as  any  other  Carnot  going,  and  his  remarks  are  as 
well  worth  repeating.     I  can  then  go  home  and  write  out 


238  TWFNTV    VK ARS    IN    PARIS 

that  the correspondent,  lia\  ing  called  at  the  Elysee, 

saw  Carnot,  and  asked  him  his  oi)inion  on  the  question, 
and  that  Carnot  said  .  .  .  and  so  on.  And  I  can  file 
tliat  cable  with  an  easy  conscience,  and  defy  any  man  to 
call  it  or,  which  is  more  important,  to  prove  it  a  fake. 
The  editor,  no  doubt,  has  his  own  views  on  the  genuine- 
ness of  the  stuff;  but  as  he  does  not  pay  anything  extra 
for  a  high-life  interview,  I  suppose  he  is  not  particular  as 
to  its  authenticity." 

Of  course,  the  bulk  of  the  American  reading  public 
does  not  attach  much  importance  to  kings  and  rulers  ; 
does  not  know  who  or  what  they  are,  and  would  consider 
the  awe  with  which  the  European  regards  this  class  as 
a  convincing  and  final  proof  of  the  degeneracy  of  the  Old 
World.  This  means  that  an  "  interview  "  with  a  king  or 
an  emperor  would  not  appear  to  them  a  feature  of  any 
exceptional  interest  in  their  morning  paper.  I  remember 
that  in  a  leader  in  the  New  York  World  the  editorial 
comment  made  upon  an  account  which  I  had  sent  from 
Berlin  in  1887  of  a  visit  paid  by  Czar  Alexander  to  old 
Emperor  William  was  :  "  Philosophical  people  over  here 
who  read  of  this  tomfoolery  will  not  regret  that  they  live 
in  a  Republic  where  even  the  visit  of  a  President  would 
not  be  regarded  as  a  very  great  event  if  it  did  not  '  bring 
trade  to  town.'  "  In  England,  however,  the  attitude  of 
the  public  is  different.  Our  worship  for  the  royalties  is 
so  pronounced  that  we  delight  in  the  mere  narrative  of 
their  doings,  and  it  is  amongst  English  readers  that  the 
imaginative  chroniclers  to  whom  I  refer  above  find  their 

o 

easiest  dupes.  During  the  twenty  years  of  my  life  in 
Paris  I  was  brought  as  much  as  any  other  publicist  of 
standing  into  the  august  atmosphere  which  surrounds 
the  thrones,  but  I  will  not  pretend  that  what  I  there  saw 
and  what  I  there  heard  were  things  of  such  paramount 


THE   GEOGRAPHICAL    HOTEL  239 

importance  as  to  warrant  me  in  giving  any  special  pro- 
minence to  them  in  my  pages. 

As  to  this  august  atmosphere,  I  often  think  of  my  visits 
to  a  certain  hotel  in  Paris,  which,  because  it  was  largely, 
indeed  almost  exclusively,  patronised  by  royalties,  was  a 
house  to  which  many  of  the  richest  Americans  schemed 
to  gain  admission.  For  it  was  not  a  hotel  to  which  any 
man  might  drive  up  and  engage  rooms.  One  had  to  be 
known  to  the  proprietor,  and  one's  record  had  to  be  an 
unexceptional  one.  One  newspaper  proprietor  had  to 
pass  a  long  probationary  period  after  his  first  visit  to 
Paris  before  he  was  allowed  to  register  at  this  exclusive 
house.  Mere  wealth  was  by  no  means  a  passport  to  these 
exalted  regions.  My  business  frequently  took  me  there  ; 
and  whilst  my  card  was  being  taken  up  to  the  person 
whom  I  had  come  to  see,  it  used  to  delight  me,  from  a 
certain  place  in  the  hall  which  adjoined  the  servants' 
staircase,  and  whose  advantages  of  situation  I  had  dis- 
covered by  accident,  to  listen  to  the  conversations  of  the 
lackeys  and  other  servants.  I  used  to  call  the  house  the 
"  geographical  hotel,"  and  indeed  one  heard  little  else 
but  the  names  of  countries,  principalities,  dukedoms,  and 
counties.  Portugal,  one  might  hear,  was  clamouring  for 
his  cafd-azi-lait,  and  would  Thurn  and  Taxis  have  his 
buttered  toast  now  or  when  he  could  get  it  ?  Scandi- 
navia had  rung  his  bell  at  least  a  dozen  times,  and  the 
question  was,  did  the  Baltic  Provinces  imagine  that  the 
legs  of  French  chambermaids  were  made  of  cast-iron  or 
of  flesh  and  blood  ? 

Hard  by  this  hotel  was  an  English  bar  where  the 
gentlemen  of  the  geographical  personages  referred  to 
used  to  assemble  of  an  evening,  and  it  was  amusing 
indeed  to  listen  to  their  conversations  from  a  gallery 
which    overlooked    the  drinking-saloon.     Here,   indeed, 


240  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

might  OIK!  learn  iliat  to  his  valet  no  man,  even  the 
greatest,  is  a  hero.  Over  the  clinking  glasses  the 
chroiiique  scaudalcuse  of  courts  was  engendered,  and 
perhaps  here  were  first  set  afloat  the  evil  rumours  that 
assail  the  loftiest  thrones.  I  remember  telling  Edmond 
de  Goncourt  one  evening  of  this  place  and  of  the  things 
that  one  curious  might  overhear,  and  he  said  that  there 
was  no  doubt  that  it  was  in  the  drinking-shops  of 
Versailles  that  first  took  flight  the  horrid  lies  that,  waxing 
ever  stronger,  smothered  at  last  under  their  noisome 
winsfs  the  fair  fame  of  Marie  Antoinette. 

No  finer  passage  exists  in  French  prose  than  the 
lines  which  Edmond  and  Jules  de  Goncourt  wrote  upon 
the  gradual  growth  of  calumny  in  that  masterpiece  of 
their  joint  literary  labours,  the  monograph  on  Marie 
Antoinette,  and  I  have  no  doubt  that  when  they  penned 
those  words  the  authors  had  conceived  some  such  scene 
as  that  which  I  then  described  to  the  surviving  brother. 
I  know  that  Edmond  de  Goncourt  was  keenly  interested, 
and  made  me  twice  describe  what  I  had  seen  and  heard, 
once  to  illustrate  something  that  he  had  been  saying 
to  Daudet,  and  again  as  I  was  driving  towards  Passy 
with  him. 

In  1883  I  used  to  live  in  the  Rue  Lesueur,  exactly 
opposite  the  house  occupied  by  the  consort  of  Queen 
Isabella,  Dom  Francis,  whose  main  occupation  in  life 
it  was  to  take  his  dogs  out  for  walks  in  the  Bois  de 
Boulogne.  There  was  a  story  current  that  each  of  these 
dogs  was  named  after  some  former  rival ;  but  I  do  not 
believe  this,  for  more  than  once  I  saw  Queen  Isabella 
greeting  her  husband  from  her  carriage  as  she  drove 
past  him  in  the  Avenue  du  Bois,  and  watched  him  bow 
in  return.  There  was  certainly  a  great  show  of  courtesy 
maintained   between    the  two  spouses.     Dom    Francis's 


A    KING   AND    HIS    DOGS  241 

dogs  were  particularly  poodlish  poodles,  the  curled, 
beribboned,  pampered  pets  which  so  excite  the  ire  of  an 
English  terrier,  and  it  was  one  day  by  rescuing  one  of 
his  ex-Majesty's  dogs  from  the  jaws  of  a  one-eyed, 
cock-eared,  bull-pup  from  a  stable  in  the  Avenue  de  la 
Grande  Armee,  that  I  was  admitted  to  the  distinguished 
honour  of  conversation  with  the  ex-King. 

We  talked  mainly  about  dogs,  and  I  was  surprised 
at  the  royal  ignorance  on  the  subject.  He  seemed  to 
be  very  much  better  informed  on  the  topic  of  the  history 
of  Hortense  Schneider,  whose  former  hotel  adjoined  his 
more  modest  abode.  However,  there  was  one  anecdote 
connected  with  her  career  which  he  did  not  know,  and 
which,  when  I  told  it  to  him,  made  him  laugh. 

One  day  that  Napoleon  HI.  found  his  solitude  down 
at  the  palace  at  Biarritz  intolerable — the  Empress  and 
her  ladies  being  away — he  telegraphed  to  Paris  to  the 
Court  official  who  attended  to  that  sort  of  thing  for  him, 
"  Envoyez  Schneider."  He  made  elaborate  preparations 
for  the  reception  of  the  bright  Grand-Duchess  of 
Gerolstein.  A  dainty  petit  souper  was  laid  out  in  the 
most  private  of  the  private  apartments.  The  amorous 
monarch  expected  the  arrival  of  the  charming  actress 
with  pleasing  emotions.  When,  however,  "  Schneider" 
arrived,  and  was  shown  into  the  scented  boudoir,  it  was 
no  ravishing  Hortense  that  beamed  upon  the  sight  of 
the  eager  Emperor,  By  mistake  the  procurer  in  Paris 
had  sent  to  Biarritz  Schneider  the  Minister,  a  fat,  fussy, 
and  intolerable  little  man,  who  was  the  Emperor's 
special  bugbear  at  Cabinet  Councils. 

Dom  Francis  seemed  to  have  very  bigoted  ideas  on 
the  divine  rights  of  kings.  I  believe  that  considerable 
tomfoolery  of  ceremonial  was  observed  in  his  small 
house.      His    servants   had  the  "  charges  "   of  a  Royal 

16 


242  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Court  assiy^ned  to  them.  It  was  said  that  a  fcninic-de- 
m^fws;€,  or  charwoman,  the  Mrs.  Kidgcrbury  of  the  Rue 
Lesueur,  once  she  passed  the  threshold  of  his  house, 
became  a  Lady  of  the  Hedcliamber,  and  I  will  not 
assert  that  the  EncrJish  stable  lad  who  looked  after  His 
Majesty's  poodles  was  not  dic^nified  with  some  such 
name  as  Master  of  the  Royal  Kennels.  Dom  Francis 
had  all  the  little  ways  and  manners  of  kings.  He  used 
to  give  his  hand  as  though  expecting  the  bacia-mahos ; 
and  when  he  had  nothing  more  to  say  to  one,  used  to  step 
back  in  the  approved  fashion  by  which  kint^s  signify  one's 
dismissal.  He  was  a  great  contrast  to  another  Spanish 
monarch,  Dom  Pedro,  of  Brazil,  whom  I  saw  several 
times  after  his  expulsion  from  his  empire.  Monsieur  de 
Lesseps  had  introduced  me  to  him  in  the  kindest  terms. 

He  was  in  very  poor  health  on  his  arrival  in  France. 
Indeed,  it  was  said  that  the  revolutionaries  had  waited 
till  his  disease  had  quite  broken  down  his  strength  and 
courage  before  coming  to  extremities.  He  was  the 
quietest  and  most  simple  of  men,  and  he  seemed  very 
pleased  to  think  that  as  soon  as  he  recovered  his  health 
he  should  be  able  to  attend  the  meetings  of  the  Academy 
of  Sciences,  of  which  he  was  a  corresponding  member. 
He  told  me  he  looked  forward  to  being  able  to  read  a 
great  number  of  books,  which  "  as  a  monarch"  he  never 
had  had  the  time  to  do.  He  asked  me  many  questions 
about  Lesseps,  and  he  shook  hands  with  me  each  time 
that  I  took  leave  of  him.  He  was  as  democratic  an 
emperor  as  one  could  imagine,  and  I  do  not  think  that 
that  was  because  he  had  been  dethroned  and  ranked 
himself  an  Emperor  no  longer.  He  frequendy  expressed 
the  opinion  that  Brazil  would  tire  of  the  Republican 
form  of  Government  and  revert  to  monarchy.  Until  his 
death  he  believed  that  he  would  be  recalled.     The  last 


MY    FAREWELL   TO    DOM    PEDRO      243 

occasion  on  which  I  saw  him  was  just  as  he  was  leaving 
for  Vichy,  and  as  I  bade  him  farewell  I  expressed  the 
hope  I  might  next  have  the  honour  of  saluting  him  in 
Rio  Janeiro — ''  Sur  le  trone,  sire,"  I  said,  and  the  ex- 
monarch  smiled,  for  at  that  moment  he  was  sitting  on  a 
Saratoga  trunk,  in  the  disorder  of  his  departure. 

One  evening,  while  dining  at  Sylvain's,  I  got  into 
conversation  with  a  swarthy,  middle-aged  gentleman, 
whom  from  his  manner  and  volubility  of  talking  I  took  to 
be  a  Southern  Frenchman.  We  seemed  to  be  interested 
in  the  same  topics,  and  as  we  finished  dining  at  the 
same  time  we  left  the  restaurant  together.  It  was  the 
stranger  who  suggested  we  should  take  a  stroll,  and  in 
his  company  I  walked  down  the  boulevards  and  the 
Rue  Royale  into  the  Place  de  la  Concorde.  There  we 
crossed  the  bridge,  and  continued  down  the  Boulevard 
St.  Germain  till  we  reached  the  Boulevard  St.  Michel. 
We  went  up  this  boulevard  and  entered  Bullier's.  Here 
at  the  door  the  stranger  was  requested  to  give  up  his 
walking  stick,  and  as  he  refused  to  do  so,  he  was  not 
allowed  to  enter.  I  noticed  that  there  was  a  crest  and 
an  inscription  on  the  handle  of  the  stick.  He  left  me 
and  went  off  in  a  cab. 

Some  students  who  had  recognised  him  told  me  that 
my  companion  was  Milan  of  Servia,  and  it  then  occurred 
to  me  that  his  face  was  quite  familiar  to  me.  He  had 
told  me  many  interesting  things  during  our  long  walk, 
and  had  shown  himself,  as  subsequent  events  demon- 
strated, a  clever  prophet  in  matters  political.  I  am  afraid 
that  I  have  no  recollection  whatever  of  the  things  which 
he  said,  but  they  were  all  duly  recorded  in  an  article  which 
I  wrote  for  my  paper,  TAe  jVezu  York  Journal.  It  was 
entitled,  "  A  Night  Out  With  a  King,"  and  hugely 
diverted  New  York.     Mr.  Albert  Pulitzer,  the  proprietor 


244  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

of  the  paper  in  those  days,  told  iik-  this  himself,  con- 
gratulated me  on  the  "  story,"  and  as  an  afterthought 
asked.   "By  the  way,   was  it  true?" 

The  first  conversation  that  Queen  Nathalie  granted 
to  any  one  for  purposes  of  publication  after  her  separation 
from  her  husband  was  given  to  me.  I  had  the  honour 
of  waiting  upon  the  Queen  in  a  house  on  the  Avenue 
du  Bois.  I  remember  that  the  interview  was  a  very  sad 
one,  and  that  I  felt  very  depressed  as  I  drove  away. 
Under  the  circumstances  I  ought  to  have  been  exultant, 
and  my  dejection  consequently  shows  that  the  lady's 
attitude  and  manner  had  profoundly  enlisted  my  sym- 
pathies. For,  as  far  as  I  remember,  she  did  not  tell  me 
anything  of  a  very  distressing  nature.  I  only  know  that 
I  wrote  to  America  that  I  had  seen  a  heart-broken 
woman. 

I  often  used  to  see  her  son,  young  Alexander,  while 
he  was  a  schoolboy  in  Paris,  and  one  night  saw  him 
sittinsf  outside  the  Cafe  Americain  drinkino:  what  looked 
like  absinthe  and  smoking  cigarettes.  He  was  in  the 
costume  of  lyceen,  and  looked  a  big,  overgrown  school- 
boy. Presently  two  greatly  excited  men  came  rushing 
up,  and  an  animated  conversation  ensued  between  them 
and  the  young  monarch.  It  appeared  that  the  young 
King  had  been  taken  to  the  Opera,  but  had  managed  to 
slip  out  during  the  performance,  and,  determined  "on 
seeing  life,"  had  hastened  round  to  the  Caf6  Americain 
to  enjoy  himself  in  the  way  I  have  described.  He  said 
that  he  was  tired  to  death  of  ceremonial  and  fussing,  and 
absolutely  refused  to  return  to  the  Opera  until  his  two 
guardians  had  joined  him  in  a  final  drink.  It  was  to 
some  extent  the  unfortunate  tastes  which  led  him  to  the 
Cafe  Americain  that  night  that  gave  the  regicides  a 
pretext    for  the   abominable   crime    to    which    the   poor 


KING    LEOPOLD   OF    BELGIUM         245 

youth  fell  a  victim.      I  will  not  record  what  had  been  the 
subject  of  his  remarks  to  me  until  he  was  discovered. 

A  king  who  is  never  wanting  in  the  collection  of 
the  people  who  write  about  their  royal  acquaintances  is 
Leopold  of  Belgium,  the  most  amiable  and  hospitable  of 
monarchs.  During  the  season  at  Ostend,  when  he  walks 
on  the  front,  it  requires  but  very  little  manoeuvring  on 
the  part  of  a  person  of  English  or  American  appearance 
to  get  into  conversation  with  the  old  gentleman  and  to 
enjoy  a  crack  with  a  king.  The  only  tacit  stipulation  is 
that  he  is  not  to  be  recognised  as  the  King.  He  will 
continue  to  chat  until  "Your  Majesty"  or  "Sire"  is 
introduced.  Then  he  precipitately  retreats.  He  likes  to 
talk — or  in  former  days  used  to  like  to  talk — about  the 
Channel  service  between  Ostend  and  Dover.  He  was 
the  creator  of  the  line,  and  is  largely  interested  in  it.  He 
used  to  be  delighted  to  hear  it  praised.  On  one  occasion 
at  Ostend  I  referred,  in  conversation  with  the  old  gentle- 
man, whom  I  had  met  on  the  front,  to  Jean  Volders,  the 
Socialist  leader,  and  the  old  gentleman  said,  "  He's  King 
of  Belgium."  It  is  certain  that  at  that  time  poor  Volders 
had  very  great  influence  in  the  country.  I  saw  him,  with 
a  stroke  of  the  pen,  in  the  office  of  Le  Peitple  in  Brussels, 
put  a  stop  to  the  general  strike  which  had  already  caused 
bloodshed  and  which  threatened  a  revolution. 

Leopold  is  particularly  amiable  to  journalists,  and  has 
all  the  belief  of  the  modern  business-man  in  the  value  of 
advertising.  When  Stanhope,  of  the  New  York  Herald, 
was  on  his  way  back  from  Hamburg  after  testing,  in  his 
own  person,  the  efficacy  of  the  anti-cholera  vaccination, 
King  Leopold  asked  him  to  dinner.  He  seems  recently 
to  have  accorded  his  confidence  to  an  Irish  journalist 
named  John  de  Courcy  Macdonnell,  whom  I  knew  in  a 
dreadful  plight  in  Dieppe  a  year  or  two  ago,  and  who  has 


246  TWr.XTV   VKARS    I\    PARIS 

of  late  stepped  forwartl  as  tlu;  chaiiii)ion  of  the  Belgian 
administration  of  the  Conoo. 

Helgiuni  is  a  very  democratic  country,  thou^di  perhaps 
not  so  much  as  Norway  or  Sweden.  I  remember  one 
day,  as  I  was  riding  in  tlu"  tram  from  Middlekerke  to 
Ostend,  we  saw  two  ladies  by  the  roadside  signalling 
to  the  conductor  to  stop.  The  regulation  is  that  the 
trams  only  stop  at  certain  fixed  spots,  and  these  ladies 
were  not  near  any  such  point.  The  conductor  was  pre- 
paring to  pull  the  cord,  when  a  commercial  traveller  who 
was  in  the  car  cried  out  that  he  had  no  right  to  stop  the 
car,  that  the  car  was  due  at  Ostend  at  such  an  hour,  and 
that  he  would  only  just  have  time  to  catch  his  train  to 
Brussels,  "But,  vmlJieuretix  ! ''  cried  a  friar  who  was 
amongst  the  passengers,  "don't  you  recognise  those 
ladies  ?  Don't  you  see  that  they  are  the  Queen  and 
the  Princess  Clementine?"  "1  wink  my  eye  at  the 
Queen,  and  still  more  so  at  the  Princess  Clementine," 
said  this  very  democratic  commercial  gentleman.  "  Re- 
gulations are  regulations,  and  the  cars  are  not  to  stop 
except  at  fixed  places.  It  is  neither  the  Princess  Clemen- 
tine nor  the  Queen  who  will  pay  me  for  my  time  and 
expenses  if  I  miss  the  Brussels  train  through  their  fault." 
I  need  hardly  say  that,  in  spite  of  his  remonstrances,  the 
car  was  stopped  and  the  ladies  were  taken  up.  The 
commercial  man  grumbled  loudly  all  the  way  to  Ostend, 
and  there  could  be  no  doubt  that  the  two  princesses  knew 
what  he  was  grumbling  about.  For  my  own  part  I  do 
not  like  to  see  queens  and  princesses  of  the  blood  royal 
riding  in  tramcars.  I  think  that  as  soon  as  royalty 
becomes  democratic  its  raison  d' etre  ceases.  The  king 
ought  not  to  mingle  with  the  man  in  the  street.  I 
remember  that  when  I  first  went  to  Christiania  I  was  told 
that  I  should  easily  recognise  the  King  walking  about  in 


KING   OSCAR   OF    SWEDEN  247 

the  town,  as  he  was  the  only  man  in  the  capital  who  wore 
a  top-hat,  except  Ibsen. 

King  Oscar  of  Sweden,  as  he  must  now  be  styled, 
is  of  monarchs  the  most  accessible,  as  he  is  one  of  the 
most  gracious.      Each  week  at  the  Palace  in  Stockholm 
he  holds  a  reception  which  is  open  to  all — his  subjects 
and  foreigners  alike.      Nor  is  it  difficult  for  anyone  who 
presents  himself  in    the    name    of  literature  or  science 
to  be  admitted  to  private  audience.      He  also  has  a  kind- 
ness  for  journalists.      I    remember  that  during  my  first 
visit  to   Stockholm,  being  desirous  of  writing  an  essay 
on  the  Queen  of  Sweden,   and   finding  it  impossible  to 
obtain  any  truthful  particulars  about  her  in  a  city  where 
she  is  not  popular,  I  wrote  in  desperation  to  the  King 
direct,  as  the  person  most  likely  to  be  able  to  give  me 
information    about   the  good    lady.     In    Germany   such 
an  application  might  have  involved  me  in  a  prosecution 
for  Majestaets-Beleidigztng.     In   other  countries,  except 
perhaps  Belgium,  no  notice  would  have  been  taken  of  it. 
In  Stockholm  ^the  result  was  pleasing  and  swift.      I  had 
posted    my  letter   to   the    King    in    the    morning ;    that 
evening,  on  entering  my  hotel,  the  porter  called  after  me, 
"  There's  a  letter  here  for  you."     I  expected  no  corre- 
spondence, so   I  asked,    "Who's  it   from?"     "Oh,   it's 
from   the    King,    I    think,"  said  the  porter  in  the   most 
matter-of-fact  tone.     "  I  wonder  what  he  wants  now  "  is,  I 
suppose,  what  I  ought  to  have  said,  with  the  air  of  a  man 
who  is  importuned.      I  did  not.      I  was  too  pleased,  and 
I  opened  the  King's  missive  eagerly.     It  was  a  kind  letter, 
referring  me  to  Chamberlain  von  Celsing,  who,  so  ran  the 
communication,  had  been  instructed  to  put  himself  at  my 
disposal,  and  to  give  me  all  the  information   I  required. 
When  on  a  subsequent  visit  to  Sweden  I  had  the  honour 
of  speaking  to  the  King,  and  told  him  how  grateful  I  had 


24S  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

been  for  his  kindness  on  that  occasion,  lie  said,  "  Ne  faut- 
11  pas  s'cntr'aidcr  cntrc  hommcs  de  lettrcs  ?  "  I  said, 
'•  On  s'entre-tuc  plutot,"  and  he  laughed.  I  heard  after- 
wards that  he  had  been  much  pleased  with  the  essay 
1  wrote  on  his  literary  work. 

The  first  })lace  where  I  spent  some  time  in  the  com- 
pany of  Marshal  IVIacmahon,  ex-President  of  the  French 
Republic,  was  in  the  police  lock-up  in  the  Rue  du  Fau- 
bourg St.  Honore.  He  was  brought  in  by  the  arm  just 
two  minutes  after  my  own  arrest,  and  on  exactly  the 
same  charge  of  "refusing  to  circulate."  It  was  in  the 
days  of  Boulanger  ;  there  had  been  a  disturbance  at 
the  Chamber,  and  a  mild  street  riot  had  broken  out  on 
the  Place  de  la  Concorde.  On  such  occasions  it  is  the 
tactics  of  the  Paris  police  to  seize  in  periodical  rushes 
upon  as  many  of  the  general  public  as  can  be  grabbed 
and  hauled  off  to  the  station,  leaving  it  to  the  Commissary 
of  Police  to  select  those  whom  he  will  detain,  "  to  recog- 
nise his  own."  I  happened  to  be  in  one  of  these  hauls, 
and  was  waiting  at  the  lock-up,  in  the  company  of  a 
number  of  other  rioters  as  little  riotous  as  myself,  when, 
loudly  protesting  and  greatly  offended  in  his  dignity, 
the  old  Marshal  was  marched  in  with  a  policeman  holding 
each  arm.  The  brigadier  immediately  recognised  him 
(his  subordinates,  of  course,  had  failed  to  do  so),  and 
sprang  to  attention  after  giving  the  military  salute. 

It  appeared  that  the  Marshal  had  not  moved  on  fast 
enough  whenordered  to  do  so,and  on  being  spokento  again 
had  answered  in  an  obstreperous  and  rebellious  fashion. 
The  brigadier  poured  forth  torrents  of  abuse  on  the 
unlucky  agent s-de-ville  who  had  arrested  the  ex-President, 
"  Monsieur  le  Marechal,"  "  Monseigneur  le  Due  de 
Magenta,"  and  so  on  ;  and  the  old  gentleman  failed  to 
show    that    magnanimity    which    the    truly    great    are 


THE   MAGNANIMITY   OF   THE  GREAT     249 

supposed  to  display  on  such  occasions.  He  bestowed  no 
largesse  upon  his  captors  ;  he  did  not  request  the  brigadier 
to  refrain  from  abusing  the  humble  subordinates,  who 
had  but  done  their  duty  and  had  shown  themselves  no 
respecters  of  persons.  Indeed,  he  added  a  little  abuse 
of  his  own,  and  went  off  vowing  that  the  men  should  be 
reported  to  headquarters  without  any  delay. 

I  have  often  thought  that  very  probably  on  similar 
historical  occasions  the  truly  great  have  at  first  shown 
temper ;  that  the  magnanimity  only  came  afterwards  as 
an  afterthought,  as  it  occurred  to  the  great  man  that  it 
would  look  well  in  his  anecdotal  history  to  have  shown 
himself  superior  to  common  passions.  I  have  always 
believed  that  Napoleon  was  very  much  annoyed  with  the 
sentry  who  would  not  let  him  pass — "  no,  not  even  if  he 
were  the  Little  Corporal  himself" — and  I  am  quite  certain 
that  that  sentry  never  got  on  very  well  in  his  career. 

It  was  a  fortunate  circumstance  for  the  other  rioters, 
including  myself,  that  the  Marshal  was  arrested,  for  after 
this  blunder  the  brigadier  feared  to  add  to  his  responsi- 
bilities, and  dismissed  the  lot  of  us,  taking  our  own 
statements  as  to  our  social  position  and  importance.  I 
was  thus  able  to  get  back  to  my  work  in  good  time, 
after  having  fully  resigned  myself  to  the  prospect  of 
spending  the  night  in  a  cell. 

Some  time  later  I  was  ordered  from  New  York  to 
call  on  Marshal  Macmahon  and  to  ask  him  to  talk  about 
St.  Patrick.  The  New  York  World,  for  which  I  was 
then  acting  as  correspondent  in  Paris,  was  publishing 
a  number  of  interviews  with  prominent  men  the  world 
over  on  St.  Patrick  and  St.  Patrick's  Day,  and  Marshal 
Macmahon's  remarks  on  these  subjects  were  badly  wanted. 
It  may  be  mentioned  that  at  that  time  the  main  supporters 
of  Mr.  Pulitzer's  paper  were  the  Irish  Catholics  in  New 


2 so  TWKXTV   VF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

York.  I  much  recrrettcd  on  receiving  this  cable  that  I 
had  not  arranged  for  the  acquaintance  of  a  Macmahon  in 
Paris,  similar  to  that  which  my  colleague  had  formed  with 
the  wine-seller.  It  seemed  a  hopeless  errand  to  go  to 
call  on  the  ex-President,  who  had  a  detestation  of  all 
interviewing  and  newspaper  publicity,  to  ask  him  silly 
questions  on  a  subject  so  absurd.  I  was,  however,  able 
to  accomplish  my  task  honestly  and  without  recourse  to 
artifice.  The  result  was  a  cable  despatch  to  the  JVew 
Yoj'k  Wor/d  which  filled  a  column  and  a  half  of  that 
paper,  and  on  which  the  editorial  comment  was  that 
"  every  student  of  history  would  be  delighted  to  read  it, 
and  that  the  story  from  his  own  lips  of  the  part  which 
he  took  in  the  Franco-Prussian  war  and  his  utterances 
resfardino;-  '  what  miorht  have  been  '  had  a  value  which 
made  the  despatch  a  document  of  the  highest  historical 
importance."  So  strongly  did  the  editor  hold  the  view 
of  the  importance  of  what  I  had  considered  a  very  trivial 
conversation  with  the  oruff  old  soldier  of  the  Rue  de  Belle- 
chasse  that  the  whole  text  of  my  article  was  cabled  back 
to  the  Figaro  and  to  Galignani s  Messenger  for  insertion. 
I  do  not  remember  that  the  Marshal  said  anything  of 
very  great  importance  to  me.  I  expect  that  the  mere 
fact  of  having  been  admitted  to  a  long  conversation  with 
the  Marshal  was  considered  an  achievement.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  there  had  been  no  difficulty  whatever  in  getting 
an  introduction  to  him  from  a  mutual  friend.  I  did  not 
refer, to  our  first  meeting-  in  the  course  of  our  conversation. 
With  President  Carnot  I  had  some  relations.  He 
granted  me  and  my  friend  Adrien  Marie  permission  to 
visit  him  at  Fontainebleau,  for  the  purposes  of  an  illus- 
trated article  on  his  life  in  that  palatial  summer  retreat. 
He  subsequently  allowed  me  to  visit  the  whole  of  his 
private   apartments    in    the    Elys(^e ;    and    while    I    was 


CARNOT   AND    THE    KANGAROO       251 

viewing  one  of  the  drawing-rooms  which  adjoined  his 
study,  he  came  in  and  spoke  to  me  in  a  very  friendly 
manner.  He  told  me  that  he  very  well  remembered 
seeing  me  at  the  Australian  section  of  the  Exhibition 
the  year  previously. 

I  had  been  present  at  the  President's  visit  to  the 
Wine  Kiosk  in  the  Trocadero  Gardens,  and  had  accom- 
panied the  party  which  escorted  him  over  the  place. 
I  remember  that,  after  contemplating  a  huge  kangaroo 
which  stood  outside  the  building,  Carnot  asked  if  those 
animals  were  dangerous,  and  one  of  the  Australian 
magnates  answered  in  English  that  that  depended  upon 
how  they  were  stuffed.  I  did  not  translate  this  remark 
to  the  President ;  and  I  do  not  think  that,  if  I  had  done 
so,  he  would  have  appreciated  the  humour  of  it.  He 
stood  on  his  dignity  on  official  occasions,  and  might  have 
resented  chaff  But  then,  as  always,  he  showed  himself 
most  good-natured  and  obliging. 

The  different  wine-growers  whose  products  were  on 
exhibition  in  this  kiosk  were  naturally  anxious  that  the 
President  should  taste  their  wines,  and  the  way  in  which 
the  unfortunate  man  lent  himself  to  their  desires  filled 
me  with  admiration.  Australian  wines  may  possibly  be 
drinkable  at  table,  but  drunk  between  meals  must,  I 
should  say,  be  almost  poisonous.  Yet  Carnot  drank  four 
large  glasses  of  various  horrid  cms,  while  protesting  that 
his  doctors  did  not  allow  him  to  take  anything  between 
meals.  The  only  comment  that  he  made  on  the  wine, 
which  to  him  must  have  seemed  very  nasty,  was  in  a 
remarkable  question  which  he  put,  turning  round  to  me, 
as  to  whether  the  Australian  wine-growers  were  certain 
that  they  were  within  their  legal  rights  in  giving  such 
names  as  "  claret,"  "  burgundy,"  '•  chablis,"  etc.,  all  French 
names,  to  their  vintages. 


2S2  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Apropos  of  Adrien  Marie,  it  may  not  be  out  of  place 
in  this  chapter  X.c>  mention  that  after  his  sad  death  at 
the  ht^spital  at  Marseilles  I  wrote  a  short  article  upon 
the  sad  position  in  which  his  family  had  been  left  by  his 
loss,  and  that  this  article,  being  read  at  Windsor,  brought 
from  Queen  Victoria  to  the  editor  of  the  London  daily 
in  which  my  account  had  appeared,  a  command  that  any 
pictures  or  drawings  of  his  that  might  be  available  should 
be  sent  down  for  the  royal  inspection,  with  the  result 
that  a  purchase  was  made  and  a  sum  of  money  paid  over 
which  came  to  the  poor  wife  and  children  as  a  most 
useful  help  in  a  time  of  great  need.  Even  the  humblest 
of  her  subjects  has  reason  to  remember  with  gratitude 
and  affection  the  bountiful  kindness  of  that  good  woman 
and  great  Queen,  and  to  resent  with  anger  how  truly 
in  her  case  the  saying  has  been  proved  that  "  the  dead 
die  quick." 

The  last  occasion  on  which  I  saw  Marie  was  at  a 
cafd  near  the  Hotel  d'Albe,  where  I  had  been  calling 
on  Dhuleep  Singh.  It  was  just  after  his  quarrel  with 
the  Queen,  his  Aventine  secession,  and  while  he  was 
clamouring  for  the  return  of  his  estates  and  family  jewels. 
I  had  had  a  hasty  conversation  with  his  Royal  Highness, 
while  he  lay  smoking  cigarettes  in  bed  in  a  room  on 
the  fourth  floor  of  the  Hotel  d'Albe;  and  from  the 
appearance  of  the  room  and  the  attitude  of  the  waiters 
I  had  come  to  the  conclusion  that  the  Koh-i-noor  would 
certainly  help,  as  the  French  say,  "  to  put  butter  in  the 
spinach  "  of  this  prince. 

Marie  was  then  hesitating  as  to  whether  or  not 
he  should  accompany  an  expedition  to  Lake  Tchad,  in 
Africa,  and  I  spent  half  an  hour  in  beseeching  him  not 
to  go.  I  said  what  is  quite  true :  that  overworked, 
nervous  men   who  have   no  constitution   and  who  have 


A   VICTIM    OF   AFRICA  253 

lived  hard  in  cities,  may  go  on  indefinitely  in  their 
accustomed  surroundings ;  but  that  once  they  change 
these  and  alter  their  habits  and  way  of  life,  they  expose 
themselves  to  every  risk.  "  It  is  policy  with  us,"  I  said, 
"  not  to  attract  the  attention  of  Fate  to  our  persons." 
He  fancied,  however,  that  he  was  strong  enough  for  the 
venture,  and  was  brought  home  dying,  to  expire  in  a 
hospital  in  Marseilles. 

When  I  heard  of  his  death  I  felt  that  I  had  been 
a  prophet  of  evil,  and  prayed  that  never  upon  his  fateful 
journey  my  ominous  words  might  have  brought  disquiet 
to  his  gentle  heart.  He  was  a  great  loss  to  the  coterie 
of  black-and-white  artists  in  Paris,  who,  working  for  the 
illustrated  press,  were  brought  into  daily  [contact  with 
the  foreign  correspondents.  I  had  many  dealings  with 
him,  and  have  never  worked  in  collaboration  with  an 
artist  whom  I  liked  better. 

I  often  think  of  the  day  we  spent  together  as  the 
guests  of  President  Carnot  at  Fontainebleau.  I  believe 
that  it  was  thanks  to  the  high  esteem  in  which  he  was 
held  that  we  were  treated  with  the  courtesy  and  kind- 
ness that  were  there  shown  to  us.  I  was  struck  by  the 
deference  shown  to  him  by  the  officer  who  escorted  us 
over  the  President's  apartments.  I  remember  also  the 
occasion  on  which  we  went  down  to  Bonnelles,  to  visit 
the  Duchesse  d'Uzes.  I  had  preceded  him  to  Limours 
the  night  before.  It  was  just  on  the  eve  of  the  day  on 
which  the  shooting  season  opened  in  that  department, 
and  the  inn  at  which  I  put  up  was  crowded.  I  was 
accommodated  on  a  mattress  in  the  billiard-room  ;  and 
the  next  day,  when  Marie  came  down,  I  made  a  joke 
which  since  then  has  kept  on  going  the  rounds  of  the 
world's  Press.  I  have  always  arrogated  to  myself  the 
original  authorship  of  the  feeble  witticism,  though  very 


254  TWENTY   VF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

possibly  it  has  an  earlier  i)arentage.  I  told  Marie  that, 
having  slept  on  the  billiard  table,  I  had  been  charged 
for  the  use  of  the  table  at  so  much  the  hour  on  the 
night  tariff. 

The  occasion  of  our  visit  to  the  Chateau  de  Bon- 
nelles  was  a  (He  chanipctrc  which  the  Duchess  was 
giving  to  the  peasantry,  and  we  were  both  struck  by 
the  somewhat  parsimonious  nature  of  the  entertainment. 
There  was  no  hotel  at  Bonnelles,  and  no  arrangements 
whatever  had  been  made  for  our  necessities.  Marie 
and  I  were  debating  whether  we  should  not  join  a  qiLeiie 
of  peasants  who  were  being  regaled  on  hulking  sand- 
wiches and  wine  and  water  in  a  booth  on  the  lawn — for 
we  had  eaten  nothing  all  day,  and  it  was  then  well  on 
in  the  afternoon — when  Meyer,  the  editor  of  the  Gau/ois, 
saw  us  and  came  up.  He  asked  if  our  wants  had  been 
attended  to,  and  when  Marie  told  him  that  his  stomach 
was  in  his  heels,  he  nobly  came  to  the  rescue. 

I  have  heard  many  bitter  things  said  about  Arthur 
Meyer,  but  the  fact  is  that  that  day  he  was  a  very  raven 
to  two  starving  prophets.  He  marched  us  off  to  the 
banqueting  hall  of  the  castle,  and  set  the  lackeys  bustling 
to  attend  to  our  wants.  He  seemed  like  a  beneficent 
and  autocratic  major-domo  in  the  ducal  halls,  and 
specially  instructed  the  butler  as  to  the  particular  brand 
of  claret  which  he  was  to  serve  with  the  pasty  which 
was  put  before  us.  I  could  not  help  remarking  to  Marie 
that  if  Arthur  Meyer  had  not  been  endowed  with  the 
journalistic  talents  which  had  won  him  his  great  wealth 
and  position  in  Paris,  he  might  have  shone  in  a  humbler 
but  not  less  useful  sphere. 

It  was  on  that  day  that  I  had  a  conversation  with 
the  Duchess,  and  I  conceived  a  great  admiration  for  the 
plucky  little  woman.     We  talked  about  Boulanger,  and. 


THE  DUCHESS  AND  BOULANGER  255 

referring  to  the  report  that  she  had  given  the  General 
three  millions  for  the  purposes  of  his  campaign,  she  said 
that  she  did  not  deny  it,  and  that  she  had  been  ready 
to  give  him  anything  that  it  would  have  been  possible 
for  her  to  give. 

I  have  not  seen  many  duchesses  so  entirely  devoid  of 
affectation  and  pose.  I  fancy  Madame  Lefebvre,  in  her 
more  amiable  moods,  must  have  greatly  resembled  her. 
But  this  Duchess's  sans  gene  is  not  that  which  proceeds 
from  bad  manners.  She  is  a  sportswoman,  and  has  la 
bonne  franquette  of  such.  I  was  not  the  less  impressed 
by  what  she  said  to  me  about  the  part  she  had  played 
in  the  politics  of  the  moment  because  as  she  was  speak- 
ing she  was  sitting  on  the  bed  in  the  state  bedroom, 
to  which  she  had  conducted  me  to  show  me  the  portrait 
of  some  illustrious  ancestor  of  the  d'Uzes  family,  and 
kept  emphasising  her  remarks  by  slashing  her  riding- 
whip  on  the  counterpane. 

We  had  a  long  walk  back  to  the  station  at  Limours  ; 
for  it  was  Arthur  Meyer's  great  regret,  as  he  told  us, 
that  he  could  not  put  a  carriage  at  our  disposal.  Marie 
was  very  much  knocked  up  by  the  want  of  food  and 
the  fatiguing  trudge,  and  it  was  remembering  this  that 
I  suggested  to  him  at  our  last  meeting  that  he  had 
not  the  strength  to  face  the  hardships  of  the  African 
expedition. 


CHAPTER     XVII 

President  Camot — A  Garden  Party  at  Fontainebleau— A  Reception  at  the 
Elysee— A  First  Glimpse  of  Loubet — James  G.  Blaine — A  Conversation 
at  the  Hotel  Binda— Blaine  on  Various  Subjects — The  Statesman  and 
his  Shadow— American  Politicians — A  Presidential  Shooting  Party — 
Carnot's  First  Cabinet— Carnot's  Assassination — A  Card  from  Casimir- 
Perier — Henri  d'Orleans  and  Esterhazy — The  Marquis  de  Flers  and 
Comte  d'Herisson — On  Paying  Members  of  Parliament — General 
Boulanger 

AFTER  our  informal  meeting  in  the  drawing-room 
at  the  Elysee,  it  became  possible  for  me  to  obtain 
by  indirect  means  expressions  of  opinion  from  Monsieur 
Carnot  on  various  occasions,  and  though  I  must  disclaim 
all  responsibility  for  such  headings  as  were  often  pre- 
fixed in  New  York  to  my  cable  despatches  as,  "  President 
Carnot  discusses  Boulanger  with  Our  Correspondent." 
I  could  fairly  claim  to  be  in  touch  with  the  President 
of  the  Republic.  Not  very  long  after  my  attendance 
at  one  of  his  first  receptions  at  the  Elysee  I  received 
a  card  of  invitation  to  one  of  Madame  Carnot's  garden 
parties  at  F"ontainebleau,  and  spent  three  very  agreeable 
and  instructive  hours  amongst  the  better  dressed  of  the 
French  Republicans.  The  buffet,  which  at  Presidential 
parties  is  always  the  centre  of  attraction,  was  laid  in  the 
Louis  XIV.  kiosque,  in  the  centre  of  the  famous  carp 
pond,  built  by  Fran9ois  Premier — the  scene,  in  fact,  of 
the  flirtations  between  the  Roi  Soleil  and  poor  Made- 
moiselle de  La  Valliere.     That  afternoon  there  were  also 

256 


A   FETE   AT   FONTAINEBLEAU         257 

private  theatricals  in  the  theatre  of  the  Palace,  which 
had  not  been  used  ever  since  the  days  of  Napoleon  III. 
The  last  performance  that  had  been  given  there  was  one 
in  which  Empress  Eugenie  took  part  in  a  play  entitled 
Les  Portraits  de  la  Marquise,  which  had  been  specially 
written  for  the  imperial  comddienite  by  Octave  Feuillet. 
I  remember  with  what  pride  the  old  novelist  once  showed 
me  the  blotting-book  which  the  Empress  had  presented 
to  him  as  a  souvenir  of  that  occasion.  A  beautiful 
portrait  of  herself  was  framed  in  the  cover,  and  in  it 
was  written :  "In  affectionate  remembrance  to  my 
author. — Eugenie." 

At  a  reception  held  at  the  Elysee  on  January  13, 
1888,  I  was  honoured  with  a  few  minutes'  conversation 
with  the  President,  in  the  course  of  which  he  mentioned 
the  name  of  James  Blaine.  Monsieur  Carnot  asked  about 
him,  on  hearing  that  I  had  recently  been  in  his  company, 
with  much  interest,  and  said  how  pleased  he  had  been 
to  meet  him  during  his  stay  in  Paris,  I  described  a 
conversation  I  had  had  with  the  American  statesman, 
who  still  at  that  time  was  the  first  favourite  for  the 
Republican  nomination  as  candidate  to  the  Presidency 
of  the  United  States.  The  reception  that  night  followed 
on  a  dinner  given  to  the  commanding  generals  of  the 
French  army,  and  was,  I  remember,  a  very  brilliant  one. 
All  Paris  was  there,  and  no  better  crowd  of  well-dressed 
women  than  those  had  ever  before  been  collected  in  the 
Elysee   salons  since  the    days   of  Marshal    Macmahon. 

We  were  not  to  witness  that  night  what,  under 
President  Grevy,  one  so  often  saw  at  the  Elysee  recep- 
tions, the  storming  of  the  buffet  by  famished  and  eager 
democrats,  literally  fighting  to  get  to  the  tables  where 
food  and  drink  were  being  dispensed.  Nor  that  night 
did  I  see  any  one  filling  his  pockets  with  provisions  and 

17 


25S  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

cigars.  Under  llic  Grevy  n'gimc  that  was  a  common 
sight  on  gala  nights  at   the   Elysee. 

Madame  Carnot,  I  remember,  wore  a  very  beautiful  ball 
dress  of  white  brocade,  dt'co/lcttU  with  a  long  straight  train. 
On  either  side  of  the  skirt  was  a  panel  of  white  satin, 
embroidered  with  gold  bands.  The  corsage  also  glittered 
with  the  similar  rich  embroidery.  She  wore  her  magnifi- 
cent diamonds.  Poor  woman  !  she  looked  radiantly  happy, 
little  realizing  with  what  anguish  she  was  later  on  to 
pay  for  these  transient  grandeurs.  Fallieres  was  in 
great  form,  expounding  in  sonorous  phrases  the  reasons 
which  had  prompted  the  Government  to  dismiss  a 
magistrate  named  Yigneau  from  his  post.  It  was  that 
night,  I  think,  that  I  first  saw  Emile  Loubet.  He  was 
talking  amidst  a  group  of  senators,  and  his  topic,  as 
usual,  was  about  wine  from  a  financial  point  of  view. 
A  few  days  previously  the  famous  Romanee-Conti 
vineyard  had  been  offered  for  sale,  but  had  not  found 
a  single  bidder,  though  the  original  price  had  been 
reduced  by  three  thousand  pounds,  and  he  was  heard 
to  wonder  what  the  American  millionaires  were  thinking 
about  to  let  such  a  good  investment  escape  them. 
General  Logerot  was  talking  with  a  lady  about  the  duel 
on  the  Belgian  frontier,  where  a  French  officer  had  shot 
a  Prussian  officer  who  had  insulted  a  French  lady.  It  is 
difficult  for  even  the  greatest  men  to  refrain  from  talking 
on  their  special  subjects. 

The  gathering  was  a  fashionable  one,  not  unworthy 
of  the  traditions  of  the  place.  The  people  were  well 
dressed;  there  were  a  number  of  brilliant  officers  present, 
and  the  whole  atmosphere  was  one  which  one  was 
unaccustomed  to  in  Republican  circles.  Towards  the 
end  of  Carnot's  Presidency  this  atmosphere  was  wanting. 
The  democrats  invaded   the  salons   of  the  Elysee  with 


DEMOCRACY   AT   THE    ELYSEE        259 

the  airs  of  men  who  had  a  right  to  share  in  the  enjoy- 
ments of  power.  Some  very  queer  people  were  seen 
to  have  obtained  cards  of  admission,  and  I  remember 
one  night  witnessing  a  quarrel  between  an  American 
journalist  and  a  countrywoman  of  his  which  created  quite 
a  scandal.  The  journalist  reproached  the  woman  with 
her  presence,  saying  that  a  person  of  her  reputation 
ought  not  to  have  ventured  to  have  presented  herself 
in  such  a  place.  She  retorted  that  her  claims  to  be 
present  were  at  least  as  good  as  his,  and  charged  him 
publicly  with  being  a  blackmailer. 

The  meeting  with  James  Blaine,  to  which  I  referred 
in  my  conversation  with  the  President,  had  taken  place 
at  the  Hotel  Binda  on  the  previous  December  16. 
He  was  then  thinking  of  going  on  to  Rome.  "  I  came 
to  Paris  in  October,"  he  said,  "  intending  only  to  stay 
three  weeks,  and  here  I  am  still.  I  want  to  get  away. 
I  don't  like  your  Parisian  winters,  and  I  don't  like  your 
French  fires.  They  are  not  at  all  comfortable.  You 
have  to  wear  very  heavy  coats  outside,  and  you  don't  get 
warm  when  you  get  back  indoors." 

"  But,  Mr.  Blaine,"  I  said,  "  you  have  pretty  cold 
winters  in  the  States,  have  you  not  ?  " 

"  On  the  whole,"  he  said,  "  we  are  accustomed  to 
milder  weather  in  the  States.  The  most  northern  point 
of  the  United  States  is  about  on  a  level  with  London, 
while  Virginia  is  about  on  a  par  with  Africa.  Yet  we 
have  rigorous  winters,  too,  in  the  States — worse  than  in 
St.  Petersburg.  Just  think  !  the  coldest  weather  they 
have  there  is  eight  degrees  Fahrenheit,  while  sometimes 
in  America  we  have  it  as  cold  as  thirty-two  degrees." 

We  talked  on  a  great  variety  of  topics,  a  batons 
rompus.  It  was  in  these  terms  that  the  Presidential 
candidate  spoke  of  his  introduction  to  the  newly  elected 


26o  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

President  of  PVancc  :  "  Throuirli  the  courtesy  of  Mr. 
McLane.  Mr.  Morton  and  myself  were  presented  yester- 
day. He  received  us  with  the  greatest  cordiahty,  and 
charmed  us  with  his  civility.  He  took  me  to  his  wife's 
reception,  and  placed  the  Presidential  box  at  the  Opera 
at  my  disposal." 

Mr.  Blaine  then  spoke  about  the  recent  election  in 
France.  "  I  was  pleasantly  surprised,"  he  said,  "  at 
the  very  quiet  way  in  which  the  recent  crisis  was 
resolved.  The  French  are  very  demonstrative,  but  at 
the  bottom  have  excellent  good  sense.  I  was  at  the 
Versailles  Congress,  and  saw  the  whole  proceedings. 
One  thing  struck  me,  and  that  is  that  of  all  the  Houses 
of  Parliament  I  have  seen  it  is  in  the  American  House 
of  Congress  where  the  members  behave  with  the  most 
decorum.  The  shouting,  the  cheering,  and  the  '  Hear, 
hear ! '  that  you  are  so  fond  of  in  England,  would  not 
be  tolerated  there,  nor  are  they  ever  heard.  Nor  would 
any  Member  of  Congress  think  of  keeping  his  hat  on  his 
head,  as  the  English  Members  of  Parliament  do.  Yet 
I  must  say  that  a  little  applause  is  a  great  encouragement 
to  a  speaker,  just  as  it  is  to  an  actor.  The  Roman 
actors  used  to  demand  it,  you  remember,  with  a  final 
'  Vos  Plaudite.'  In  America  approbation  is  shown  to 
the  speaker  by  the  members  crowding  round  him." 

Mr.  Blaine  then  asked  me  several  questions  about 
myself,  and  told  me  that  my  name  had  "got  to  America." 
"  I  sat  next  to  a  Congressman  of  your  name  in  Congress 
some  years  ago,"  he  said.  He  began  to  talk  about  his 
children  ;  and  apropos  of  the  lessons  which  one  of  his 
daughters  was  receiving  in  a  French  school,  he  said  : 
"  One  thing  that  I  have  noticed  about  the  French 
educational  system  is  what  I  may  describe  as  its  some- 
what   narrow    patriotism.     The   geography    of    France 


BLAINE   ON    FRENCH    PATRIOTISM     261 

appears,  for  instance,  to  be  the  only  geography  that  the 
French  teachers  think  worth  knowing;  and  according  to 
them  the  eighty-seven  departments  of  France  are  far  and 
away  more  important  and  worthy  of  study  than  the 
thirty-two  States  of  the  Union." 

We  talked  about  patriotism,  and,  amongst  many 
things,  Mr.  Blaine  said  :  "I  fancy  the  Germans  must 
feel  considerable  irritation  at  the  Parisians  for  keeping 
the  statue  of  Strasburg  on  the  Place  de  la  Concorde,  and  at 
the  way  they  go  on  about  Alsace-Lorraine.  The  French 
seem  to  forget  that  fhey  originally  took  these  countries 
from  the  Germans  ;  that  the  language,  customs,  ways  of 
thinking,  and  even  names  of  these  people  are  German  ; 
and,  moreover,  that  it  is  to  the  fact  of  their  having  the 
plodding,  industrious,  go-ahead  character  of  the  German 
race  that  they  owe  their  prosperity  and  their  wealth. 
It  is  my  opinion  that  in  three  generations  at  most  the 
people  of  Alsace  and  Lorraine  will  once  again  be 
Germans,   heart  and  soul." 

In  due  course  we  came  to  talk  about  literature,  and 
Blaine  said  :  "  I  am  not  astonished  to  hear  that  the 
French  take  no  interest  whatever  in  the  Shakespeare- 
Bacon  controversy.  The  French  know  next  to  nothing 
about  American  affairs,  and  very  little  about  the  English. 
I  myself  am  interested  in  the  question,  in  so  far  that  I 
know  Mr.  Donnelly.  He  is  a  very  ingenious  and  subtle 
student.  My  own  opinion  on  the  question  is  that  it  is 
unfair  and  practically  impossible  to  argue  as  to  the 
authenticity  of  the  works  of  a  man  who  died  three  hundred 
years  ago.  It  does  sound  improbable  that  a  man  like 
Shakespeare,  a  lounger  in  tap-rooms,  a  convicted  poacher 
and  ne'er-do-weel,  who  did  not  even  succeed  in  any 
measure  in  his  profession  as  a  third-rate  actor,  should  be 
the  author  of  such  works,  and  that  we  should  owe  the 


262  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

sublimest  literature  of  any  ag(^  and  tono'ue  to  such  a  man. 
But,  as  I  say,  argument  ah  i))iprobabilc  is  eminently 
unfair.  Marlowe,  for  instance,  was  a  man  of  notoriously 
bad  life.  One  might,  arguing  ab  improbabilc,  state  that 
it  is  impossible  that  he  should  be  the  author  of  his  works. 
But  this  has  never  been  contested.  Again,  look  at 
Burns.  When  we  hear  of  him  lounging  about  in  village 
pothouses  and  putting  down  the  whisky  and  the  gin,  we 
might  by  the  same  argument  prove  that  he  was  not  the 
author  of  the  beautiful  poems  which  he  wrote." 

Poor  Mr.  Blaine  was  at  that  time  being  haunted  by 
the  correspondent  of  an  American  paper  who  had  a 
French  nobiliary  title.  "  He  is,"  said  he,  "  the  plague  of 
my  life.  He  followed  me  here  from  F'lorence.  He 
hangs  about  the  hotel.  Sometimes  he  comes  walking 
into  this  room  as  if  by  mistake,  so  as  to  have  the  oppor- 
tunity to  apologise  and  thus  begin  a  conversation.  I 
have  told  him  a  hundred  times  that  I  will  not  be  inter- 
viewed, but  he  will  not  let  himself  be  beaten  off  The 
hotel  people  can't  turn  him  out,  for  he  has  engaged  a 
room  here,  and  has  threatened  to  scarify  them  in  his 
paper  if  they  give  him  notice.  I  am  not  a  betting-man, 
Sherard,  but  I'd  wager  that  he  has  got  his  ear  to  the  key- 
hole of  the  door  at  this  very  minute.  Just  you  look  out 
and  see  if  you  don't  find  him  hanging  about  in  the 
passage  as  you  go  out." 

Here  the  ex-Secretary  w^as  interrupted  by  some  one 
who  pushed  open  the  door  of  the  private  sitting-room  in 
which  we  had  been  talking.  Blaine  ran  to  cover  like  a 
scared  rabbit.  I  saw  him  dart  across  the  room  and 
plunge  headlong  into  an  adjoining  bed-room,  where  he 
locked  himself  in.  The  intruder  was  not,  however,  the 
count,  but  a  chambermaid  who  had  come  to  attend  to 
the  fire.     When  she  had  gone,  the  American  statesman 


BLAINE    AND    HIS   SHADOW  263 

returned  to  me.  His  face  was  really  quite  pale.  He 
said  :  "  I  haven't  the  nerve  to  face  the  man.  A  few  days 
ago  I  had  to  ring  the  bell  to  ask  the  manager  to  come 
and  turn  him  out.  He  sticks  to  one  like  a  leech.  Even 
in  the  States  I  never  came  across  such  a  pertinacious 
fellow." 

It  was  quite  as  Mr.   Blaine  had  expected.     When  I 

had  got  outside  his  room  I  found  Count  de standing 

quite  close  to  the  door,  pretending  to  be  reading  some 
advertisements  which  were  hung  up  in  a  frame  in  the 
passage.  He  fastened  on  to  me  at  once.  "  Part  a  deux," 
he  said.  I  told  him  that  I  did  not  run  my  business  on 
mutual  principles.  "  But  you  might  tell  me  what  you 
were  talking  about."  I  said,  what  was  quite  true,  "  We 
talked  about  green  peas  and  the  French  way  of  cooking 
them.  Secretary  Blaine  prefers  the  American  style. 
And  we  talked  about  Bacon."  With  that  I  got  rid 
of  him. 

It  was  to  a  newspaper  man  of  the  same  class  that  one 
day,  during  Blaine's  stay  in  Paris,  I  told  that  I  had  heard 
from  a  grisette  who  was  acquainted  with  a  young  woman 
of  her  class  "  qui  avait  des  bontes  "  for  one  of  Blaine's 
relations  who  was  studying  in  Paris,  that  Blaine  often 
went  to  visit  the  irregular  indnage,  and  had  indeed  been 
seen  talkino-  to  his  morranatic  relation  in  the  streets. 
"  Say,  there's  money  in  that !  "  cried  this  very  sordid- 
minded  scribe.  "  A  snapshot  of  James  G.  Blaine  talking 
in  the  streets  of  Paris  with  that  abandoned  young  female 
should  upset  the  Republican  apple-cart,  and  should  be 
worth  I  won't  say  how  many  hundred  dollars  from  a 
Democratic  paper."  He  actually  went  on  to  propose 
that  we  should  contrive  to  get  such  a  "  picture,"  and  was 
surprised  at  my  indignation  at  the  suggestion.  "  You'll 
not  make  your  fortune  with  those  prejudices,"  he  said. 


264  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

lie  was  a  very  yellow  journalist,  and  really  saw  no  harm 
in  the  villainy  which  he  had  proposed. 

During  my  life  in  Paris  I  was  brought  into  contact 
with  most  of  the  great  American  politicians.  I  wonder 
what  has  become  of  Mr.  Bugg  Grub,  who  loomed  large 
in  his  own  estimation  as  an  American  politician  in  1888  ? 
Senator  Ewart,  who  used  to  dress  like  Palmerston, 
received  me  whenever  he  came  to  Paris,  and  was  a 
courtly  and  interesting  old  gentleman.  I  think  that  he 
tried  to  model  himself  on  Gladstone,  with  whom  he 
fancied  himself  distantly  related.  I  remember  meeting 
Secretary  Whitney  and  being  asked  to  call  upon  him  at 
the  Hotel  du  Rhin.  At  Whitelaw  Reid's  receptions  one 
came  into  contact  w^ith  the  members  of  the  French 
Government.  I  was  impressed  with  the  entire  absence 
of  arrogance  which  was  displayed  by  these  great  men. 
I  suppose  that  in  a  country  which  is  ruled  by  its  press,  a 
journalist  is  considered  a  person  of  some  importance. 

To  return  to  my  connection  with  Carnot,  the  first 
occasion  on  which,  so  to  speak,  I  was  in  his  company 
was  in  1887,  that  is  to  say,  just  after  his  election,  and 
very  shortly  after  his  first  meeting  with  Mr.  Blaine.  I  had 
been  anxious  to  be  present  at  the  first  of  the  Presidential 
shooting-parties,  and  I  will  admit  that  it  was  because  I 
had  been  told,  first,  that  it  was  very  difficult  to  witness 
such  a  gathering,  and,  secondly,  because  the  sight  of  the 
Republican  Ministers  disguised  as  sportsmen  had  been 
described  to  me  as  an  entertainment  not  to  be  missed. 
I  had  been  able  to  procure  a  card  to  Marly,  and  on 
December  28  I  spent  a  couple  of  hours  watching  the  new 
rulers  of  France  in  their  sporting  diversions. 

On  arriving  at  Marly  Forest,  I  had  to  undergo 
some  examination  before  the  head-keeper,  and  though 
I    was    not    actually  "  rubbed    down,"    great    care    was 


A   "CHASSE"   AT    MARLY  265 

taken  to  see  that  I  carried  no  arms.  I  was  then 
conducted  to  the  pavilion  de  chasse,  a  Httle  kiosque 
on  an  eminence,  from  which  a  good  view  could 
be  obtained.  Hither  presently  President  Carnot  drove 
up,  accompanied  by  his  friends.  Fallieres  was  with  him, 
amongst  others,  and  the  amiable  General  Brugere. 
Monsieur  Carnot  was  attired  in  a  very  sportsmanlike 
suit  of  tweeds,  and  carried  a  double-barrelled  hammerless 
gun.  There  were  about  fifty  beaters  collected  on  a 
spot  some  yards  distant  from  the  kiosque.  Colonel 
Lichtenstein  and  General  Brugere  had  the  direction  of 
the  shooting-party.  Numbers  were  distributed  to  the 
ten  guns,  indicating  to  each  guest  which  layon  or  walk 
he  was  to  follow.  Twelve  paths  or  layons  run  through 
the  Marly  preserves,  and  down  each  one  guest  walks. 
Under  the  kings  of  France  there  were  only  five  layons 
in  these  preserves;  under  the  Empire  there  were  nine; 
and  as  France  becomes  more  and  more  democratic  and 
the  sovereign  people  is  admitted  to  the  sport  of  kings, 
the  number,  doubtless,  will  be  further  added  to. 

In  those  days,  however,  it  was  still  very  difficult 
to  obtain  an  invitation  to  one  of  the  President's  shooting- 
parties,  and  Colonel  Lichtenstein  told  me  that  he  never 
recommended  a  man's  name  unless  he  knew  him  to  be 
a  good  shot,  while  of  foreigners  only  the  most  dis- 
tinguished were  ever  invited.  Of  the  layons  the  middle 
one  is  the  broadest,  and  it  was  down  this  path  that 
that  day  President  Carnot  began  to  walk.  Monsieur 
Fallieres  took  the  layon  on  his  chief's  right  hand,  and 
for  once  in  his  career  was  following  in  the  steps  of  the 
Grand  Veneur  of  the  old  rdgime.  From  where  I  stood 
I  could  see  the  President  as  he  slowly  advanced,  with 
his  gun  resting  on  his  arm.  Presently,  very  quietly  and 
steadily,  like  everything  he  did,  he  raised  his  gun  and 


266  r\\'i:\  TV    NI'ARS    IN    PARIS 

\'u\\\.  It  was  a  shut  which  nuist  have  satisfied  Llchtcn- 
stein,  .irul  a  cock  pheasant  crashed  down  in  a  perfect 
storm  of  snow.  The  President  always  has  the  first 
shot,  and  after  Carnot  had  fired  and  the  signal  had 
thus  been  given,  the  guns  began  a  regular  fusillade. 
No  retrievers  being  used,  much  of  the  wounded  game 
got  away,  and  one  could  hear  all  those  pitiful  sounds 
that  at  every  battue  cry  to  heaven.  I  could  not  help 
wondering  whether  Carnot.  who  was  a  kindhearted 
man,  really  took  pleasure  in  this  slaughter  of  tame 
birds,  and  why  our  democratic  rulers  felt  it  incumbent 
upon  them  to  ape  the  sports  of  a  more  ruthless  time. 
Some  poor  hare  that  had  been  shot,  but  not  killed, 
kept  up  such  a  screaming  noise  that,  sickened,  I  walked 
away  and  did  not  return  till  the  tableau,  or  day's  bag, 
had  been  heaped  up  in  front  of  the  kiosque,  at  the  end 
of  the  shooting. 

There  were  far  too  many  rabbits  in  the  tableau 
to  look  well,  and  Brugere  said  to  Carnot  :  "  We  shall 
soon  w'ant  the  services  of  Monsieur  Pasteur  at  Marly." 
At  that  time  Monsieur  Pasteur  was  trying  some 
experiments  with  his  new  method  for  the  extermination 
of  rabbits  on  a  big  estate  near  Rheims,  with  a  view 
to  competing  for  the  offer  made  by  Australia.  Most 
of  the  game  which  was  shot  at  Carnot's  parties  was  sent 
to  the  hospitals.  Under  President  Grevy,  it  was  said, 
arrangements  had  been  made  with  the  leading  poulterers 
at  the  Halles,  for  in  those  days  the  principle  at  the 
Elysee  was  that  there  was  no  such  thing  as  "  des  petites 
economies." 

Fallieres  was  very  satisfied  with  himself  that  day, 
and  his  fat  face  was  radiant  with  smiles  as  he  emerged 
from  his  lay  on.  He  was  then  Minister  of  Justice  in 
Carnot's  first  Cabinet,  and   it  was   said  of  him   that  he 


"LE    BEAU    FALLIERES"  267 

was  very  anxious  to  throw  off  his  allegiance  to  Jules 
Ferry,  However,  very  shortly  before  that  day  I  had 
seen  him  in  the  antechamber  of  Ferry's  apartment  in 
the  Avenue  de  lena,  where  he  waited  patiently  a  long 
time  to  be  received  by  his  political  patron.  We  were 
told  that  he  was  a  man  of  very  delicate  health,  but  he 
certainly  did  not  look  so  at  the  shooting-party.  He 
was  always  very  carefully  dressed,  and  was  known  as 
le  beau  Failures.  I  have  every  reason  to  believe  that 
he  will  be  the  next  President  of  the  Republic. 

Emile  Loubet,  by  the  way,  was  Minister  of  Public 
Works  in  that  Cabinet.  We  were  far  from  expecting 
to  see  this  very  quiet  and  retiring  man  in  the  place 
of  President  Carnot,  though  we  knew  that  he  enjoyed 
very  great  influence  in  the  Senate.  He  was  at  that  time 
known  as  an  authority  on  all  things  relating  to  the 
culture  of  the  vine,  and,  like  his  chief,  Carnot,  professed 
to  dislike  all  topics  purely  political.  His  main  subjects 
of  conversation  in  those  days  were  finance  and  business. 
His  opponents  used  to  speak  of  him  as  obscure.  He 
has  since  then  come  well  into  the  fierce  light  which 
beats  on  curule  chairs.  He  also  used  to  dress  well  ; 
indeed,  Carnot's  first  Cabinet  was  largely  peopled  by 
respectably  dressed  Republicans.  It  is  true  that  the 
Prime  Minister,  Tirard,  by  profession  a  maker  of 
Brummagem  jewellery,  affected  the  disorderly  appear- 
ance and  personal  neglect  of  the  Republicans  of  1848. 

I  had  been  discussing  this  Ministry  with  Henri 
Rochefort,  at  the  Intransigeant  office,  some  days  before 
the  shooting-party,  and  he  had  said  :  "  This  Ministry 
is  an  opef'a-boujfe  Ministry,  a  set  of  dummies  thrust 
into  office  to  tide  over  the  New  Year,  when  they  will 
certainly  all  be  kicked  out.  Logerot  is  the  only  good 
man  amongst  them.     He  is  a  fine  soldier  ;  and  Boulanger, 


268  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

with  \vhi)in  1  h.uc  been  diiiinq^  to-nighl,  has  nothing 
but  good  to  say  o{'  him.  It  was  to  Logcrot  that 
Boulangcr  handed  over  the  command  at  Tunis."  This 
conversation  with  Rochefort  took  place  very  shortly 
after  the  attem[U  on  Ferry's  life,  and  I  had  been  able 
to  give  him  an  account  of  the  state  of  Monsieur  Ferry, 
as  I  had  seen  him  in  his  drawing-room.  He  told  me 
that  he  had  been  dining  with  Boulanger,  and  that  they 
had  been  talking  all  the  evening  of  the  miserable  farce 
of  the   "  Tonkinois's  "  wounds. 

"  Just  fancy,"  said  Monsieur  Rochefort,  "  I  was 
told  to-night  at  dinner  that  on  the  morrow  of  the 
attack  Ferry  was  dressed  to  go  out  shooting.  That 
shows  how  seriously  ill  he  is.  Reinach,  of  La  R(^publique 
Fraiicaise,  vouches  for  this.  Jules  Ferry  is  playing  the 
part  of  Moliere's  Malade  Iniaginaire.  You  can  imagine 
the  fright  that  the  Ferryites  were  thrown  into.  '  We 
must  make  people  think  that  he  is  dying,'  they  cried, 
and  rushed  to  put  him  to  bed.  What  they  want  is  to 
make  as  much  capital  as  possible  out  of  this  event, 
with  the  view  of  the  ultimate  election  of  their  chief  as 
President  of  the  Republic.  They  want  to  force  Carnot 
to  resign,  and  this,  you  will  see,  will  be  their  only 
political  programme.  They  have  all  the  trumps  in 
their  hands.  Carnot  is  an  excellent  man.  He  won't 
try  to  make  money  out  of  his  office,  as  Grevy  did,  nor 
save  so  much  a  year  out  of  his  stipend.  He  is, 
however,  a  man  of  very  small  capacities,  nervous,  unac- 
customed to  such  a  position,  but  above  all  hampered 
by  the  interference  of  his  old  father,  who  is  over  eighty, 
and  who  is  an  Opportunist  of  the  deepest  dye.  Yes, 
and  also  crushed  down  by  the  weight  of  the  grandeur 
of  his  grandfather." 

The  nervous  man  of  small  capacity  showed  himself, 


PRESIDENT  CARNOT'S    HEROISM       269 

when  his  last  hour  came,  a  man  of  iron  nerve  and  a 
fine  capacity  for  playing  the  hero.  "  Excuse  me,  doctor, 
but  you  are  hurting  me,"  he  said,  when  the  agonies  he 
was  suffering  at  the  hands  of  the  surgeons  after  the 
attack  in  Lyons  became  too  intolerable.  He  died  like 
a  Roman.  With  the  exception  of  the  rascally  politicians 
who  saw  in  his  death  a  possible  opening  for  their  own 
ambitions,  his  death  was  deplored  throughout  the  length 
and  breadth  of  France.  The  news  of  Caserio's  crime 
and  its  consequences  reached  me  down  at  Cap  Breton, 
a  small  fishing  village  on  the  Spanish  frontier.  At  six 
in  the  morning  the  village  crier  came  along  beating 
his  drum.  Every  now  and  then  he  paused,  and  from  a 
telegram  form  read  the  message  addressed  to  the  mayor 
of  every  commune.  His  eyes  were  streaming  with 
tears  :  "  I  have  the  atrocious  grief  to  inform  you  .  .  ." 
it  began.  Women  followed  him  sobbing.  Even  little 
children  were  crying.  One  emotional  Southerner  sitting 
outside  the  inn  of  the  village  was  seen  to  tear  his  hair, 
while  uttering  horrid  imprecations.  I  bethought  myself 
of  the  chronicler  who  wrote  of  Queen  Elizabeth's  funeral 
and  his  lines  beginning  : 

I  think  her  bargemen  might  with  easier  thighs 
Have  rowed  her  thither  in  her  people's  eyes. 

The  dead  die  quick,  but  in  many  thousand  homes  in 
France  Carnot's  gentle  memory  is  kept  alive.  For  my 
part,  as  I  write,  a  large  portrait  of  the  murdered  President 
looks  down  upon  me.  The  date  of  his  birth  is  given 
below  his  picture,  and  the  date  on  which  he  died : 
"  Mort  au  champ  d'honneur  a  Lyon  le  24  Juin,  1894." 
One  thinks  with  affectionate  remembrance  of  those  who 
have  been  kind  to  one  in  life. 

Amongst  my  papers  I  have  a  souvenir  of  the  gentle- 


270 


rWKXTV    YEARS    IN    PARIS 


man  who  follovvccl  him  in  the  Presidency  of  the   French 
Republic.      Here  it  is  : 


CASIMIR-PERIER. 

Trci  Kcionnaissani  dc  r Article  ijiiil  a 
III  it  (ju'il  Conserve 

23,  RiE  NiTOT  (Place  des  Etats-Unis). 


This  was  a  card  which  he  sent  me  after  I  had  published 
in  the  Pa/l  Mall  Gazette  an  article  in  which  I  described 
the  abominable  attacks  which  were  being  directed  against 
the  new  President,  and  explained  what  was  their  purport. 
The  principal  English  papers  are  always  read  very  care- 
fully at  the  Elysee,  and  it  was  some  gratification  to 
me  to  know  that  my  article  had  come  under  the  eyes  of 
the  person  most  likely  to  be  interested  in  it.  I  did  not 
name  the  man  who  was  at  the  bottom  of  the  attacks  on 
the  President.  He  was  obscure  in  those  days.  To-day 
he  is  a  man  of  great  importance,  but  I  will  not  give  him 
here  any  further  publicity. 

Of  Prince  Henri  d'Orleans  I  saw  what  little  was  to 
be  seen.  This  hardy  explorer  was  rarely  in  Paris.  I  had 
been  introduced  to  him  by  the  Marquis  de  F'lers,  the 
friend,  agent,  and  historiographer  of  the  Orleans  family. 
I  often  thought  that  if  the  hazard  of  birth  had  made 
Prince  Henri  the  heir-apparent,  the  Royalist  cause 
would  have  had  a  much  greater  chance  of  success  in 
France.  He  was  full  of  pluck  and  energy,  of  winning 
grace  and  bonhomie.  I  may  here  give  denial  to  the  lie 
that  on  the  steps  of  the  Palais  dc  Justice,  during  the  Zola 
trial,  the  Prince  embraced  Esterhazy.     The  only  scrap  of 


PRINCE    HENRI    AND    ESTERHAZY      271 

foundation  for  this  malicious  falsehood  was  that,  with  three 
or  four  hundred  other  people,  Henri  d'Orleans  was 
coming  down  the  steps  which  led  to  the  Place  Dauphine 
at  the  same  time  as  Esterhazy.  I  was  walking  just 
behind  the  Commandant,  and  saw  everything  that  hap- 
pened. One  old  gentleman,  who  looked  like  a  retired 
non-commissioned  officer,  did  accost  Esterhazy  and 
express  his  sympathy  with  him  for  what  he  had  undergone 
during  his  cross-examination  by  Albert  Cl6menceau,  and 
some  shouts  of  "  Vive  Esterhazy  "  were  raised.  But  the 
Prince  took  no  part  whatever  in  this  demonstration.  He 
was  accompanied  by  three  gentlemen,  and  I  have  often 
wondered  that  no  denial  has  been  published  by  them  also. 
Whilst  the  old  half-pay  officer  was  embracing  the  Com- 
mandant, Henri  d'Orleans  and  his  friends  hurried  down 
the  steps  to  a  club  brougham  which  was  waiting  for  them, 
and  I  followed,  just  in  time  to  salute  the  Prince.  We 
exchanged  a  few  words  at  the  carriage  door,  and  then  he 
drove  off.  The  motive  of  the  people  who  invented  this 
falsehood  was  to  discredit  the  Prince  on  the  one  hand  by 
making  it  appear  that  he  was  taking  an  active  part  in  the 
political  struggle,  and  Esterhazy,  on  the  other  hand,  by 
representing  him  as  the  proUg^,  and  by  implication  the 
tool,  of  the  Royalist  party.  It  is  a  lie  which  I  have  long 
wished  to  nail  to  the  counter. 

The  Marquis  de  Flers  was  an  amiable  old  gentleman 
of  the  best  type  of  French  nobleman.  I  used  to  go  to 
him  for  my  information  about  the  Royalist  party  and  the 
princes  of  the  House  of  Orleans.  As  the  Royalist  agent 
in  Paris,  he  was  a  fountain-head  of  news.  Another 
friend  whom  I  possessed  in  that  camp  was  the  Baron  de 
Orangey,  sportsman  and  author,  whose  beautiful  and 
charming  wife  perished  in  the  fire  at  the  Bazar  de 
Charite. 


272  TWT-NTY   YF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

Vor  information  ;ibom  ilu- progress  of  the  Bonapartist 
cause  I  had  several  friends  U)  go  to.  Until  Conite 
d'Herisson,  the  dijiloniat  and  author,  was  appointed 
to  a  post  in  the  colonies,  I  used  frequently  to  call  upon 
him  at  his  house  in  the  Avenue  de  la  Grande  Armee. 
He  had  a  wonderful  collection  of  portraits  of  Napoleon, 
and  I  remember  how  greatly  he  inflamed  my  conceit,  on 
the  first  occasion  on  which  I  called  there,  by  telling  me 
that  as  he  came  into  the  room  where  I  was  waiting  for 
him,  and  caught  sight  of  me  sideways  looking  up  at  some 
picture  on  the  wall,  I  was  "  Bonaparte,  retour  d'Egypte 
tout  crache,"  and  he  showed  me  a  sketch  of  the  young 
General  at  that  period,  I  fancied  that  the  length  of  my 
hair  was  the  main  point  of  resemblance ;  but  one  is 
always  half-hearted  in  repelling  compliments  of  a  gratify- 
ing nature.  For  the  rest,  the  last  century  produced 
thousands  of  pseudo-Napoleons,  and  Lucina  still  casts  in 
that  mould.  I  presume  that  the  explanation  of  it  is  that 
the  tremendous  impress  made  upon  the  imagination  of 
humanity  by  that  superhuman  man  manifests  itself  in  this 
way  also.  It  is  a  well-known  physiological  fact  that 
pregnant  women  can  communicate  to  their  offspring  some 
vague  resemblance  to  a  type  on  which  their  thoughts 
during  pregnancy  have  been  concentrated.  We  have 
Biblical  authority  for  that,  and  what  is  recorded  of  the 
Greek  women  need  not  here  be  repeated. 

The  Comte  d'Herisson  was  a  charming  man  and  a 
clever  writer.  He  sent  me  many  of  his  books.  One 
which  particularly  interested  me  was  his  history  of  the 
Cabinet  Noir,  which  is  the  name  given  in  Paris  to  that 
police  department  where  private  letters  are  opened  and 
read  before  being  delivered  to  the  people  for  whom  they 
are  intended,  when  they  are  supposed  to  contain  political 
or  other  information  as  to  which  the  Government  or  the 


IN    THE    BONAPARTIST   CAMP         273 

police  are  curious.  I  could  tell  many  stories  of  my 
own  experiences  at  the  hands  of  the  Cabinet  Noir. 
Another  Bonapartist  acquaintance  on  whom  I  had 
counted  for  exclusive  news  about  the  party  was  G.  de 
Cassagnac,  the  brother  of  the  editor  o'i  U AutoriU.  Un- 
fortunately, very  shortly  after  we  had  come  to  know 
each  other,  he  was  killed  in  a  duel. 

The  foreign  correspondent  who  lives  in  a  country 
which  is  under  a  Republican  form  of  Government  is  more 
likely  to  number  amongst  his  acquaintances  the  most 
famous  of  the  political  men  in  that  country  than  one  who 
exercises  his  profession  in  a  monarchy.  In  France  one 
gets  almost  an  undue  sense  of  one's  importance  as  one 
reviews  the  distinguished  politicians  with  whom  one  has 
had  dealings.  The  shabby  deputy  who  takes  an  absinthe 
with  you  at  your  expense  at  a  boulevard  cafd  may  be 
Prime  Minister  one  day,  and  the  Senator  whose  flat 
adjoins  yours,  and  whose  bonne  sometimes  asks  your 
cook  for  the  loan  of  a  frying-pan,  may  by  a  turn  of  the 
political  wheel  be  seen  driving  behind  a  coachman  with 
a  tricolor  cockade  on  his  hat.  In  the  newspaper  world 
one  hobnobs  with  possible  great  men,  for  when  a  French 
politician  is  "  out  "  he  usually  takes  to  journalism.  A 
gentleman  who  was  quite  recently  one  of  the  Cabinet, 
some  years  ago  delivered  with  his  own  hands  at  my 
porter's  lodge  a  book  which  he  had  written.  It  was 
accompanied  by  a  letter  asking  me  to  be  so  good  as  to 
review  it  as  lengthily  as  possible.  I  was  addressed  as 
"Cher  Confrere"  (I  am  not  certain  that  it  was  not 
"  Cher  Maitre  "). 

A  great  American  newspaper  proprietor  once  com- 
plained to  me  that  his  Paris  correspondents,  after  a  short 
stay  in  that  capital,  developed  the  airs  and  graces  of 
"  lofty    young   diplomats "  ;    and    really   there    is,    as    I 

18 


274  TWENTY   VFARS    IN    PARIS 

pointed  out  to  the  editor,  some  excuse  for  them.  With 
potential  Excellencies  courtinq-  their  favours,  they  may 
well  deluilf  themselves  as  to  their  social  importance. 

In  which  connection  I  wish  to  say  that  a  conclusion 
which  every  one  comes  to  who  watches  the  political  world 
in  Paris  is  that  it  is  not  at  all  a  i^ood  thing  that  Members 
of  Parliament  should  receive  stipends  from  the  nation. 
A  political  career  is  in  every  country,  one  knows,  a 
speculation  ;  but  where  the  first  steps  are  made  so  easy 
for  the  aspirants,  a  very  worthless  type  of  men  are 
attracted  to  the  game.  The  briefless  barrister,  the 
unsuccessful  lawyer,  the  apothecary  of  the  Homais  type, 
the  veterinary  surgeon  who  has  failed  to  please  his 
clientele,  the  journalist  with  no  other  talents  than  that  of 
self-advertisement,  see  in  the  subsidy  paid  to  Members  of 
Parliament  an  immediate  inducement  to  postulate  for 
Parliamentary  honours.  There  is  a  cash  inducement  to 
serve  one's  country.  This  there  is,  of  course,  elsewhere 
also  ;  but  in  other  countries  the  payment  is  deferred  at 
least  until  very  serious  services  have  been  rendered. 
I  want  no  better  proof  that  in  France  many  men  engage 
in  politics  with  no  other  immediate  aspirations  than  to 
become  entitled,  as  deputies,  to  an  income  of  nine 
thousand  francs  for  five  years,  than  the  fact  that  there 
exist  in  Paris  financial  agencies  which  are  prepared  to 
purchase  for  a  lump  sum  the  whole  of  the  annual  pay- 
ments to  which  the  newly  elected  deputy  becomes 
entitled.  Nine  thousand  francs  a  year  for  five  years 
means  a  total  of  forty-five  thousand  francs,  and  for  this 
the  speculators  are  prepared  to  offer  a  present  value  of, 
say,  twelve  thousand  francs,  to  be  paid  part  in  cash  and 
part  in  goods.  Yes,  the  stuffed  crocodile  and  the  old 
masters  figure,  as  in  Harpagon's  days,  in  these  sordid 
transactions.     The   speculator's    risk    is    limited    to    the 


ON    PAYING   DEPUTIES  275 

contingency  of  the  death  of  the  ex-annuitant,  for  a  dis- 
solution of  Parliament  is  not  to  be  feared  in  France  under 
the  conditions  of  the  constitution,  and  a  Dixhuit  Brumaire 
only  occurs  once  in  a  while,  Boulanger  caused  some 
qualms  of  anxiety  to  the  agencies  in  his  day  ;  but,  again, 
a   Boulanger  only  comes  once  in  a  long  while. 

It  is  not  a  good  thing,  I  maintain,  that  the  suspicion  may 
lurk  in  the  breasts  of  the  electorate  that  a  man  solicits  their 
suffrages  with  no  other  motive  than  the  wish  to  lay  hands 
on  a  sum  of  a  few  thousand  francs,  a  Crucifixion  attributed 
to  Michel  Angelo,  and  a  barge-load  of  Sevilla  oranges. 
The  certainty  always  subsists  that  as  soon  as  the  money 
has  been  spent  and  the  goods  have  been  disposed  of,  the 
new  deputy  will  be  driven  to  unworthy  traffickings  by 
which  to  earn  his  living.  I  remember  one  journalist  who 
was  elected  to  the  Chamber  and  a  month  after  his 
election  was  trying  to  borrow  a  five-pound  note.  He 
had  sold  his  stipend  to  a  firm  of  usurers  in  the  Rue  de 
Rougemont  for  the  equivalent  of  four  hundred  pounds, 
and  the  largest  part  of  this  sum  had  gone  in  paying 
off  what  he  had  borrowed  for  his  electioneering 
expenses.  It  cannot  be  a  good  thing  that  amongst 
the  legislators  of  a  country  there  should  be  such 
destitute  men.  One  has  heard  of  the  deputy  who  used 
to  give  as  his  address,  "  Under  the  third  tree  to  the  left 
as  you  go  up  the  Champs-Elysees."  We  have  all  heard 
of  the  member  of  the  French  Parliament  who,  being 
without  a  domicile,  used  to  take  the  train  every  night  to 
Dijon,  riding  first-class  free  on  producing  his  deputy's 
medal.  He  said  that  he  enjoyed  the  most  refreshing 
slumbers  stretched  out  on  the  cushions,  and  that,  after  a 
while,  the  break  at  Dijon,  where  he  took  the  train  back 
to  Paris,  did  not  prevent  him  from  getting  his  proper 
rest  on  the  return  trip.      I  do  not  think  that  we  require 


276         r\vi:\  rv  yi-.\rs  in  va\us 

the  services  of  politicians  of  this  description  in  England, 
and  I  trust  that  wc  may  never  have  to  witness  what  can 
sometimes  be  seen  in  Paris  on  the  days  when  the  deputies 
tlraw  their  warrants,  namely,  a  headlong  race  between  an 
honourable  gentleman  and  a  solicitor  with  a  garnishee 
order. 

Those  that  saw  them  will  not  soon  forget  the  horde 
of  hungry  politicians  who  descended  upon  Versailles 
for  the  National  Assembly,  after  the  resignation  of 
Casimir-Perier  had  rendered  the  election  of  another 
President  necessary.  Every  unclean  appetite  seemed  to 
be  awakened  ;  the  rush  to  the  Palace  was  like  the  long, 
jubilant  gallop  of  wolves  which  scent  their  prey.  True 
descendants  of  Jourdain  Coupe-Tete,  the  democrats 
filled  the  silent  city  of  departed  kings  with  their  Rialto 
chaft'erings.  And  a  Rialto  indeed  it  was,  where  every 
vote  had  its  price  in  promises'  deferred.  The  merriment 
which  filled  the  courtyards  where  in  former  days  the 
epigrams  of  a  St.  Simon,  the  wit  of  a  Moliere,  had 
won  smiles  from  even  rebellious  lips,  was  like  one  of 
the  horse-laughs  of  history.  And  was  it  not  a  merry 
thing-  that  the  mob  of  Paris  should  have  torn  from 
this  Palace  the  gentle  Louis,  to  send  back  these  a 
century  later  to  fetch  another  ruler  ? 

The  election  of  Faure  came  as  a  surprise  to  all, 
and  to  none  more  perhaps  than  to  Monsieur  de  Blowitz, 
with  whom  I  was  sitting  in  the  big  room  in  the  Hotel 
des  Reservoirs,  when  a  scout  from  the  Palace  announced 
to  us  that  Waldeck- Rousseau's  supporters  were  going 
to  give  their  votes  to  Faure.  Till  the  very  last  minute 
it  had  been  almost  a  certainty  that  Brisson  would  be 
elected,  and  heavy  bets  had  been  made  in  his  favour. 
But  it  was  Jean-Qui-Rit  and  not  Jean-Qui-Pleure  who 
came   in  first.     There  was  little  jubilation  amongst  the 


THE    ELECTION   OF   FAURE  277 

democrats  as  they  returned  to  Paris.     The  vieilles  barbes 
were  in  consternation.     There  was  nothing  to  be  hoped 
for  any  of  them  from   the  Faure  regime.     One  hirsute, 
alcoholic,    and   ill-dressed  Republican  of  the  Extremest 
Left  who  travelled  back  to    Paris  in   the  same   carriage 
as    I   did,  kept  wagging  a  dirty  forefinger  at  me  as  he 
repeated,  with  the  tedious  insistence  of  those  who  have 
drunk  too  much,  "  La  Republique,  monsieur,  est  fichue," 
only  he  did  not  use  the  word  fichue,  but  a  stronger  term. 
"  No,  let  us  rather  say,"  said  a  stumpy  little  senator  who 
was   in   our   compartment,    "  que   la   Republique    a    subi 
un   temps    d'arret,    un    temps   d'arret,    monsieur."      The 
arret,  if  arret  there  were,  was  to  last  four  years,  during 
which  time  the   Republic   afforded   us   the    entertaining 
spectacle    of    a   democracy   aping   the   airs   and   graces 
of  the  old  regime.     It  was  still  the  rule  of  the  frockcoat, 
as  Macmahon  styled  it  contemptuously  ;   but  at  any  rate 
the  frockcoat   was    made   chez  Dusautoy,    and    was  not 
picked  up  on  the  pavement  of  the  Grand  Temple.     And 
in  modern   France  the  whole  political  struggle  can   be 
summed   up   as  a   rivalry  between  the  frockcoat  de  chez 
Dusautoy  and  the  ready-made  suit  from  the  Temple. 

The  time  was  when  the  regime  of  the  black  coat 
was  gravely  threatened,  and  when  one  had  every  reason 
to  expect  to  see  the  military  dolman  in  the  foremost 
place.  I  am  referring  to  the  episode  of  General 
Boulanger.  I  think  that  I  cannot  better  describe  the 
impression  that  was  produced  upon  me  by  this  man 
than  by  giving  here  a  copy  of  what  I  wrote  just  after 
I  heard  the  news  of  his  death.  On  the  afternoon  of 
October  2,  1891,  I  happened  into  the  Figaro  office 
just  as  the  news  from  Ixelles  had  arrived.  This  is 
what  I  wrote  that  same  night  : 

"  To  the  fioods  of  ink  that  will  flow  over  the  tiny 


278         r\vi:\  rv  yi:.\rs  in  paris 

trickle  of  Gcncr.il  Houlangcr's  blood,  will  you  allow 
me  to  contribute  my  quota?  I  am  all  the  more 
anxious  to  do  so  because,  among  l\iris  correspondents, 
I  was  specially  '  inside  '  his  career.  j)roclainied  him 
years  ago,  and  deserted  him  when  the  landau  and  the 
duchesses  came  upon  the  scene,  as  an  honinie  politically 
perdu. 

"  I  suppose  that  we  shall  hear  of  the  '  immense 
emotion  '  created  in  Paris  by  the  news  that  was  flashed 
from  Brussels  to-day  at  noon.  Alas  for  the  rarity  of 
human  charity  !  Where  Paris  has  not  shrugged  her 
shoulders,  she  has  yawned.  When  the  papers  came 
out  with  their  headlines,  people,  hearing  the  cries  of 
the  hawkers,  thought  it  was  news  of  the  suicide  of  the 
Courbevoie  murderer,  and  were  disappointed  rather 
than  interested,  the  actuality  of  Breton  being  so  much 
greater  than  that  of  Boulanger.  I  have  never  seen  a 
piece  of  news  of  such  importance,  psychological  rather 
than  political,  fall  so  terribly  flat  as  this.  It  is  true  that 
there  are  some  who  still  do  not  believe  its  truth,  for 
the  canard  is  ever  on  the  wing  ;  and  some,  perhaps,  like 
the  peasants  round  Taunton,  about  King  Monmouth, 
cannot  believe  it ;  but  with  the  large  majority  it  has 
been,  as  I  have  said,  a  yawn,  where  it  was  not  a  shrug 
of  the  shoulders.  '  Tiens,  Boulanger  s'est  donne  la 
mort,"  "  C'est-ce  qu'il  avait  de  mieux  a  faire."  Such 
are  the  remarks  one  hears  as  Paris  beats  the  opal 
absinthe. 

"  So  much  for  the  boulevards.  Elsewhere,  in  Belle- 
ville, Neuilly,  and  such  populous  quarters,  the  indifference 
is  even  more  marked.  '  It  is  not  that  which  will  prevent 
me  from  taking  another  glass,'  says,  in  my  presence, 
over  the  zinc  of  a  marchand  de  vins  counter,  a  former 
supporter  of  the  General.     At  the  clubs  the  same  senti- 


ON    BOULANGER'S   DEATH  279 

ments  are  expressed,  but  in  politer  language,  and  the 
Bacchus  here  preferred  to  piety  is  Schweppe's  and 
Courvoisier. 

"  But  indifference  amongst  the  general,  what  chuck- 
ling and  meanest  delight  among  those  that  hounded 
him  from  the  first !  '  A  la  bonne  heure  ! '  Bogey  is 
dead  and  buried.  Hannibal  shall  never  again  menace 
our  gates  and  our  sinecures. 

"  Still,  there  must  be  some  who  will  regret  the  large- 
handed,  amiable,  and  courteous  gentleman  that  he  was. 
I  have  seen  Boulanger  many  times  ;  and  even  at  the 
height  of  his  success  and  triumph,  when  the  crown  was 
in  his  grasp  and  France  was  at  his  feet,  I  never  once 
saw  him  arrogant  or  proud.  Always  a  gentleman,  the 
humbler  he  who  approached  him,  the  more  courteous 
he  was. 

"  I  remember  once  calling  on  him  at  the  Hotel  du 
Louvre,  when  half  political  and  perhaps  all  intriguing 
Paris  was  antechambering  him.  There  were  hundreds 
waiting  to  see  him,  and  only  the  very  few  could  be 
received.  The  little  page-boy  Joseph  was  swollen  with 
importance,  and  had  a  Court  of  his  own.  About  five 
minutes  before  the  reception-hour  closed  there  came 
a  ragged  old  woman  and  asked  to  be  admitted.  Joseph 
laughed  at  the  presumption.  '  There  are  hundreds 
before  you,'  he  said  ;  '  it's  not  worth  taking  in  your 
name.'  The  old  woman  cried.  She  had  walked 
twelve  miles  that  morning.  We  were  able  to  persuade 
Joseph  to  take  in  her  name,  and  he  did  so  with 
shruggings  of  the  shoulders  and  amidst  the  sneers  of 
the  expectant  suitors.  I  engaged  the  old  woman  in 
conversation  as  to  her  business.  It  appeared  that  she 
had  been  a  cantiniere  in  the  war,  had  had  her  sons 
killed  and  her  house  burned,  and  for  nineteen  years  had 


2So  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

in  vain  demanded  compensation  from  the  Government. 
Joseph  was  absent  but  a  minute,  and  when  he  returned 
it  was  to  announce,  not  that  General  This  or  Deputy 
That  was  to  pass  the  desired  portal,  but  that  '  Madame 
Aubert  was  to  be  so  kind  as  to  enter,'  which  she,  in 
rags,  did  amidst  the  envy  of  the  hundreds  who  were 
waiting.  She  was  inside  the  room  for  twenty  minutes, 
and  when  she  returned  she  was  radiant.  '  He  has  taken 
all  my  papers,'  she  said  to  me,  'and  has  promised 
immediate  attention.  I  have  s^ot  in  five  minutes  from 
him  what  from  others  I  failed  to  obtain  in  twenty  years. 
And  look  here  ! '  With  these  words  she  opened  her 
hand  and  showed  me  three  gold  pieces. 

"  There  is  one  man  in  Paris  to-day  who  will  feel 
proud,  and  that  is  Andre  Castelin,  who  yesterday  lost 
his  place  as  editor  of  the  Cocarde  because  he  refused, 
at  the  order  of  the  proprietor  of  the  paper,  to  *  rat ' 
and  turn  against  Boulanger,  As  for  another  man  about 
whom  one  thinks  at  once  at  this  juncture,  and  wonders 
what  his  feelings  may  be  to-day,  as  I  passed  just  now 
before  the  Cafe  Americain  I  saw  him,  eye-glass  fixed  and 
Londres  between  his  teeth,  slowly  mixing  an  opal 
absinthe  with  a  crew  of  sycophants  around  him.  The 
thirty  pieces  of  silver  were  spent  long  ago  ;  and  as  for 
potters'  fields,  there  be  none  on  the  boulevards  of  Paris. 
And  if  there  were,  it  would  not  be  otherwise  :  the  Cafe 
American  is  a  so  much  more  pleasant  place." 

I  think  that  it  was  on  the  occasion  of  one  of  my  last 
visits  to  the  General  at  the  Hotel  du  Louvre  that  I 
began  to  doubt  his  capacity  for  playing  the  part  which 
circumstances  and  the  general  discontent  were  forcing 
upon  him.  He  seemed  quite  nerveless ;  he  appeared 
like  a  man  exhausted  from  a  long  debauch.  "  Mon  cher 
gar9on,"     he    said,    patting    me    affectionately    on     the 


A   SMOKE   WITH   BOULANGER         281 

shoulder,  "  let  us  leave  politics  aside  and  let  us  smoke 
a  cigar."  The  floor  of  the  room — it  was  a  fourth-floor 
room  in  the  Hotel  du  Louvre — was  strewn  with  letters 
and  cards.  Here  was  another  sign  of  his  hopeless 
insouciance.  He  knew  himself  watched  night  and  day  ; 
he  knew  the  rancours  that  had  been  excited  against 
him  and  the  certain  reprisals  that  would  follow  on  his 
supporters  if  he  succumbed.  Yet  he  left  all  the  letters 
which  had  been  written  to  him  lying  about  so  that 
any  one  might  gather  them  up  in  handfuls,  I  could  have 
filled  my  pockets  with  papers  at  a  time  when  at  the 
Place  Beauvau  they  would  have  been  paid  for  at  their 
weight  in  gold.  After  his  fall  many  hundreds  of  poor 
Government  employes  were  dismissed  because  amongst 
the  General's  papers  some  missive  from  them  to  him 
had  been  found.  One  very  promising  conimissaire  de 
police  was  ruthlessly  flung  out  of  his  office  merely 
because  one  of  his  visiting-cards  was  discovered  amongst 
these  papers.  The  fright  of  those  in  power  had  been 
great,  and  their  revenge  was  in  proportion. 

After  I  had  lighted  my  cigar,  the  General  allowed  me 
to  smoke  for  a  minute  or  two  in  silence,  while  he  sat 
absolutely  inert.  At  last  he  said,  as  though  waking 
from  a  dream:  "Are  there  many  people  outside?"  I 
thought  he  must  be  joking,;  but  he  seemed  quite  in 
earnest,  and  I  gathered  that  his  dreamy  nature  did  not 
realize  many  of  the  actualities  of  the  position  in  which 
he  was  placed. 

I  said  :  "  Mon  General,  for  the  last  half-hour,  that 
is  to  say  ever  since  Joseph  brought  in  my  card,  I  have 
been  going  up  and  down  in  the  lift  of  the  hotel ! " 

"  Et  pourquoi  9a?"  he  cried,  with  a  smile  coming 
into  his  eyes. 

"  The  passage    is    packed  ;    the   stairs  are    packed ; 


2^2         rwKXTY  vi:ars  in  paris  . 

every  l.iiulinjj^  down  to  the  'ground  lloor  is  packed  with 
people  wlio  are  waiting-  to  see  you.  I  could  not  fuid 
an  inch  of  standinuj  room  in  the  crush  outside  your 
door,  and  so  I  remained  in  the  lilt,  and  have  been  up 
to  the  ceiling  of  the  hotel  and  down  into  its  lowest 
depths  awaiting  your  pleasure,  I  do  not  know  how  many 
times,  I  had  made  matters  right  with  Joseph  and  with 
the  lift-boy,  and  as  soon  as  my  turn  came  to  be  admitted, 
I  stepped  from  my  comfortable  seat  in  the  lift  and  forced 
my  way  through  to  your  door." 

He  laughed,  and  then  relapsed  into  silence  again. 
After  a  while  he  said  :  "  Que  je  suis  las,  que  je  suis  las." 
I  rose  more  than  once  to  leave,  for  he  seemed  to  have 
nothing  to  say,  and  I  knew  that  hundreds  were  waiting 
to  see  him  ;  but  each  time  he  signed  me  to  keep  my 
seat.  I  was  in  his  company  that  day  for  as  long  as 
it  takes  a  careful  smoker  to  consume  a  Havanna 
cigar,  but  during  the  time  he  barely  spoke  a  thousand 
words  to  me.  When  I  bade  him  farewell  he  rose  and 
walked  me  to  the  door  with  his  hand  on  my  shoulder, 
and  told  me  the  hour  at  which  I  should  always  find 
him  at  home.  When  I  got  outside  I  found  myself  the 
observed  of  every  eye.  I  fancy  that  the  people  waiting 
there  imagined  from  the  length  of  time  that  I  had 
been  with  the  General  that  1  had  been  laying  before 
him  the  most  weighty  proposals.  I  may  have  figured 
to  the  Government  spies  as  that  phantom  emissary 
of  Pitt  and  Coburg  who  ever  haunts  the  dreams  of 
French  politicians.  I  doubt  not  that  some  computed 
how  many  bags  of  English  gold  I  had  been  deputed  to 
lay  at  the  General's  feet.  The  truth  of  the  matter, 
probably,  was  that  Boulanger  was  very  tired  and  very 
bored,  and  kept  me  with  him  so  as  to  keep  others  out 
who  might  have  been  more  persistent  in  making  him 


A   LIGHT   ON    HIS   CHARACTER        283 

talk  and  in  worrying  him  with  proposals  which  that  day- 
he  had  not  the  energy  to  consider.  It  is  sometimes 
a  good  thing  to  be  able  to  keep  silent  in  people's 
company.  For  the  rest,  those  twenty  minutes  were  very 
eloquent  to  me,  and  I  read  the  man's  character  as  I  had 
never  read  it  before.  But  I  did  not  despair  of  his 
future  until  he  began  to  eat  the  corn  of  conquest  in  the 
grass. 


CHAPTER    XVIII 

General  Boulanger — His  Love  of  Legality — The  Duel  with  Floquet — The 
Cause  of  his  Flight — A  Newspaper  "  Beat" — The  Marquis  de  Mores — 
His  Quarrel  with  Constans — His  Duel  with  Caniille  Dreyfus — A  Trio 
of  Princes — Married  yet  Single — Prince  Murat  and  the  Heiress — The 
Tailor's  Widow  and  her  Second  Husband — A  Prince  amongst  Cooks — 
The  Gastronomical  Director — General  Tcheng-Ki-Tong— How  he  was 
lured  back  to  China — A  Sinister  Suggestion — How  a  Reputation  was 
Made. 

THE  true  cause  of  Boulanger's  failure  was  his 
absolute  respect  for  legality.  He  wished  to  make 
his  coiip  detat  without  breaking  any  laws.  He  wished 
to  make  his  omelette  without  breaking  any  eggs.  He 
had  a  feminine  horror  of  bloodshed.  Dixhuit  Brumaire 
of  the  Year  VHI  and  December  2  of  the  year  1852 
inspired  him  with  nothing  but  indignant  repulsion.  On 
the  night  of  his  election  as  deputy  for  Paris  he  could 
have  marched  into  the  Elysee  and  have  taken  possession. 
Floquet  had  packed  his  trunks,  and  Carnot  had  sent  his 
family  out  of  Paris.  I  was  in  and  about  the  Restaurant 
Durand  the  whole  night,  but  already,  at  half-past  twelve, 
everybody  had  realised  that  nothing  was  just  about  to 
happen.  "  Nothing  has  changed.  Paris  has  only  another 
deputy,"  is  the  answer  I  made  to  scores  of  people  on  the 
Place  de  la  Madeleine  as,  at  half-past  twelve,  I  emerged 
from  the  Boulangist  headquarters.  Every  one  had 
expected  that  that  night  the  General  would  lead  a 
revolution  which,  from  the  entire  sympathies  of  the 
whole  army  and  of  every  police  agent  in   Paris,  would 

284 


BOULANGER   AND    LEGALITY  285 

have  been  the  least  bloodless  that  history  has  record  of. 
I  had  certainly  no  such  expectations.  I  was  aware  of  the 
indignation  with  which  only  a  few  days  previously  the 
General  had  refused  the  offers  of  an  officer  of  the  garrison 
of  Paris — now  retired  from  the  army — to  lead  his  men 
on  their  usual  promeyiade  militaire  up  the  Boulevard 
St.  Germain,  and,  on  reaching  the  Chamber  of  Deputies, 
to  carry  out  a  Boulangist  Brumaire. 

It  is  not  with  excessive  virtue  of  civicism  that 
revolutionaries  can  succeed.  Robespierre  did  his  best  to 
teach  people  that  lesson,  and  the  executions  of  Danton 
and  Camille  Desmoulins  afforded  his  most  striking 
demonstrations.  It  has  pleased  Boulanger's  adversaries 
to  depict  him  as  a  coward.  They  said,  and  say,  that 
the  vision  of  the  peloton  d' execution,  ever  before  his  eyes, 
inspired  him  with  prudence.  It  is  a  calumny.  The  man 
was  as  brave  as  men  are.  He  deluded  himself  with  the 
belief  that  his  enormous  popularity  would  carry  him  as 
on  a  tidal  wave  to  the  shore  which  he  desired  to  reach. 
He  preferred  to  await  this  consummation  rather  than  to 
force  the  game  by  an  act  of  the  slightest  illegality. 
There  was  the  strongest  foundation  for  his  belief  I  was 
with  him  at  the  Hotel  du  Louvre  on  March  28,  after 
the  sentence  of  the  conseil  d'enqttete  had  been  passed 
upon  him  removing  him  from  his  command,  and  was 
able  to  assure  myself  of  the  overwhelming  indignation 
which  this  act  had  aroused  all  through  France. 
Thousands  of  telegrams  from  every  part  of  the  territory 
of  the  Republic  kept  pouring  in,  and  thousands  of  people 
presented  themselves  at  the  doors  of  the  hotel  to  register 
their  sympathy.  That  day  the  Government  was  terror- 
stricken.  Rioting  was  expected,  and  it  had  been  decided 
by  the  authorities  that  to  call  upon  the  army  to  help  to 
quell  them  would  be  to  provoke  a  mWiidsy  pronunciamento 


286  TWKXTV    YEARS    IX    PARIS 

in  Boulanirer's  favour.  The  authorities  had  only  the  police 
to  rely  upon.  As  to  the  officers,  up  to  the  rank  of  major, 
every  one  was  on  Boulan^er's  side.  The  older  men, 
beint^  jealous  of  Boulanp^cr's  extraordinary  popularity  with 
the  soldiers,  approved  rather  of  the  Government's  action. 
Among  civilians,  the  bourgeoisie  were  against  Boulanger; 
but  the  whole  of  the  proletariat  was  with  him  to  a  man. 

In  April  of  the  same  year  I  paid  a  visit  to  Lille, 
which  was  the  headquarters  of  the  Boulanger  electoral 
campaign  for  the  Nord  Department.  I  described  the 
place  at  the  time  as  "  literally  mad  for  Boulanger."  The 
workmen,  the  poor,  the  oppressed,  looked  to  the  General 
as  to  a  Messiah.  I  followed  him  on  different  occasions 
during  his  electioneering  tours,  and  I  witnessed  sights 
which  are  only  to  be  seen  once  in  a  century.  The 
people,  accustomed  to  neglect,  to  dupery,  do  not  readily 
deliver  themselves,  body,  soul,  and  hopes  on  this  earth 
into  one  man's  hands.  But  to  Boulanger  they  did.  Their 
confidence  in  him  was  without  limits.  Their  enthusiasm 
for  him  attained  the  degree  of  mania.  I  have  seen 
bearded  and  grimy  miners  burst  into  tears  at  the  first 
sight  of  him.  I  have  seen  ragged  women  waving  their 
babies  above  their  head  to  acclaim  him.  His  very  boots 
were  kissed  in  adulation.  He  represented  to  the  poor 
the  brave,  strong,  superhuman  man  who  was  at  last  about 
to  win  for  them  a  little  justice  and  a  little  hope.  The 
very  fact  that  the  Socialist  deputies  had  pronounced 
against  him  was  the  strongest  reason  why  the  proletariat 
believed  in  him.  Here  at  least  was  a  man  who  would 
keep  his  promises. 

It  was  hoped  by  his  adversaries  that  his  defeat  in  his 
duel  with  Floquet  would  cover  him  with  ridicule  and  turn 
the  tide  against  him.  Nothing  of  the  kind  happened. 
It  added  only  to  the  popular  enthusiasm  that  he  had  shed 


BOULANGER'S    DUEL  2%^ 

his  blood  in  the  popular  cause.  For  the  rest  there  was 
indeed  little  ignominy  in  the  defeat.  With  one  or  two 
others  I  witnessed  the  duel  from  the  top  of  the  wall 
which  surrounded  the  park  where  it  was  fought.  Neither 
Boulanger  nor  Floquet  knew  anything  about  the  use  of 
the  rapier.  Boulanger  followed  the  tactics  which  he  had 
announced  he  should  adopt,  and  the  result  was  what  had 
been  foretold.  "  As  soon,"  he  had  said,  "as  the  words, 
*  Allez,  messieurs,'  are  pronounced,  I  shall  charge  the 
enemy."  "  And  get  yourself  run  through  the  body." 
"  Nous  verrons."  And  we  saw  it.  Boulanger  charofed 
and  Floquet  retreated.  The  ground  was  wet  and  slippery. 
In  his  precipitate  backward  retreat  Floquet  tripped  up, 
and  fell  into  a  sitting  position  on  a  bush.  Boulanger 
slipped  about  the  same  time.  Floquet  was  sitting  in  the 
bush  holding  his  sword  with  both  hands,  the  pummel 
pressed  against  his  bulky  paunch,  and  the  point  sticking 
up  in  the  air.  In  his  fall  Boulanger  spitted  his  neck  on 
this  point.     He  might  easily  have  been  killed. 

It  was  not  his  defeat  by  Floquet,  it  was  not  the 
scathing  denunciations  of  Ferry,  who  called  him  a 
"  Saint-Arnaud  de  cafe-concert,"  it  was  not  the  opposi- 
tion of  the  upper  classes  of  the  bourgeoisie  and  the 
antagonism  of  the  professional  Socialists  which  broke  his 
splendid  fortunes.  It  was  not  even  the  disquiet  that  was 
aroused  in  the  hearts  of  the  masses  when  he  became  the 
darling  of  the  duchesses  and  was  seen  by  the  bare-footed 
driving  in  gorgeous  vehicles,  when  his  indiscreet  friends, 
anticipating  events,  allotted  amongst  themselves  the 
charges  of  the  new  Court,  and  the  ineffable  Chincolle 
was  heard  to  promise  to  this  lady  a  faiUeuil,  to  that  one  a 
tabouret.  Boulanger  was  in  the  wrong  when  he  went 
away.  It  was  a  simple  demonstration  of  the  truth  of  an 
old  saying. 


28S  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

The  j)UiiiniT^  of  him  id  lli^ht  has  often  been  spoken  of 
as  a  masterpiece  of  diplomacy  on  the  part  of  Constans. 
It  was  reported  that  one  day,  wlien  the  Minister  of  the 
Interii^r  w.is  expecting  the  visit  of  a  man  whom  he  knew 
to  be  affiliated  to  the  Boulanger  party,  he  left  on  his 
table,  well  in  view,  warrants  for  the  arrest  of  Boulanger, 
Rochcfort,  and  other  leaders  of  the  party.  The  man 
came,  was  allowed  to  remain  in  the  room  alone  for  a 
sufficient  length  of  time,  and  as  soon  as  he  could  get 
away  tore  post  haste  to  Passy,  and  informed  the  General 
that  he  had  not  a  moment  to  spare  if  he  wished  to  avoid 
arrest,  the  Haute  Cour,  and  the  peloton  d execution  by 
flight. 

I  was  assured  by  the  Marquis  de  Mores,  who  was 
always  exceptionally  well  informed,  that  the  real  way 
in  which  Constans  procured  the  flight  of  Boulanger  was 
by  bribing  Madame  de  Bonnemain.  Here  are  Mores's 
own  words  on  the  subject  :  "  That  was  another  of 
Constans's  master-strokes.  He  bribed  Madame  de 
Bonnemain,  Boulanger's  female  companion,  to  use  her 
influence  with  the  weak  General  to  get  him  to  commit  a 
series  of  blunders,  beginning  with  the  flight  to  Belgium 
and  ending  with  his  journey  to  Belgium,  all  of  which 
have  so  disgusted  his  former  supporters."  Mores  was 
the  very  last  man  in  the  world  who  would  wilfully  have 
slandered  any  woman,  and  it  is  quite  possible  that  his 
version  was  the  correct  one.  If  that  be  so,  it  only  makes 
it  more  deplorable  that  it  was  for  the  regret  for  such  a 
woman  that  Boulanger  should  have  put  an  end  to  his  days. 
His  suicide  was  looked  upon  as  an  act  of  cowardice  by 
his  warmest  supporters.  The  people  felt  that  they  had 
been  deserted  for  a  woman.  "  Se  tuer  pour  une  femme  " 
is  what  they  say  if  one  speaks  of  him  now,  as  though 
that  were  the  most  absurd  thing  that  a  man  could  do. 


A    NEWSPAPER    "BEAT" 


289 


As   a   dally    chronicler   during    some    years    of    the 
Boulanger  episode,    I    can    felicitate    myself  on   having 
accurately  read  the  pulse  of  France  from  the  very  first. 
In  the  early  days    I    predicted  the  astonishing    height 
of  popularity  to  which  he  would  ascend,  to  the  extent 
indeed  that  my  editor  in  America  refused  to  accept  my 
predictions.     One    day    I    received  a   peremptory   cable 
from    New  York    asking  me    "  to    give    us  a  rest  with 
Boulanger."     Later    on,    after    his    flight,  when    I    told 
them  in  New  York  that  a  definite  rest  could  be  given 
to  the  General  as  a  factor  in  modern  history,  they  again 
doubted.     However,   my   time  came  when,  on  the   eve 
of  the    September    elections   in    1890,    I    telegraphed  a 
forecast    of   the  election,   and  said  that  the  only  thing 
that  was   absolutely  certain   was  that  Boulanger  would 
not  have  a  majority   at  the  polls.     The  next  day  con- 
firmed my  prediction,  and  I  had  the  satisfaction  of  being 
the     only    correspondent    in    Paris    who    was    able    to 
announce  the  real  meaning  of  the   way   the  voting  had 
gone    that    Sunday.     The    following   are    the    headlines 
which   were  prefixed   to   my  cable  despatch,  which   was 
published  the  next  morning  in  New  York  : 

BOULANGER  ROUTED.  I 


He  Did  Not  Succeed  Yesterday  in  His 

Expectation  of  Smashing  France's 

Government. 


A  NOTABLY  QUIET  ELECTION. 

Neither   Riot   Nor    Serious    Disorder    Reported 
Anywhere. 


THE    TEST    VOTE    AT    MONTMARTRE. 


19 


20O  TWENTY   YEARS    IX    IWRIS 

I'or  the  Marquis  do  Mores  I  had  a  very  sincere 
admiration  and  great  affection.  Who  that  has  read  the 
Trots  Mousijinfaircs  but  has  wished  in  his  heart  that  it 
might  have  been  his  lot  to  meet  the  gallant  d'Artagnan  ? 
Mores  was  a  d'Artagnan  amongst  aristocrats.  He  was 
as  brave  as  he  was  handsome,  he  was  as  gentle  as  he 
was  brave.  I  had  for  him  a  hero-worship  of  which  I 
am  not  ashamed,  and  his  death  was  one  of  the  tragedies 
of  my  life.  That  he  was  good  to  me  and  a  friend  was 
all  the  more  remarkable  in  that  he  had  a  very  sincere 
detestation  of  the  English.  I  made  his  acquaintance 
just  after  he  had  returned  to  Paris  from  Toulouse,  where 
he  had  been  arrested  on  a  charge  of  attempted  murder 
during  the  disturbances  which  arose  from  his  opposition 
to  the  election  of  Monsieur  Constans.  I  think  that  if  I 
give  here  in  his  own  words  his  account  of  what  had  taken 
place,  it  will  afford  a  good  insight  into  one  side  of  his 
character.  This  is  what  the  Marquis  told  me  about 
his  adventures  at  Toulouse  : 

"  I  am  a  personal  enemy  of  Monsieur  Constans,  and 
I  have  been  so  for  the  past  five  years.  When  in  Cochin- 
China  I  made  friends  with  a  man  who  was  at  that  time 
Governor-General  of  Toncrkinsf,  a  certain  Monsieur 
Richaud.  He  was  disliked  and  feared  by  Monsieur 
Constans.  Hence  Constans's  enmity  to  me.  He  served 
me  out,  as  you  know,  by  opposing  my  schemes  for 
constructing  a  railway  on  the  Chinese  frontier  and  finally 
rejecting  my  plan.  I  wanted  to  pay  him  out  in  turn. 
W'hen  the  general  elections  came  on,  I  went  to  Toulouse 
with  the  express  purpose  of  opposing  the  election  of 
Monsieur  Constans,  as  member  fiDr  that  city.  On  the 
very  first  day  that  I  was  there  the  police  received  orders 
to  arrest  me  at  all  costs  and  under  any  pretext.  In  spite 
of  this  I  continued  my  work  of  opposition.      I  had  such 


ELECTIONEERING    IN    FRANCE        291 

proofs  of  the  tricks  of  the  Minister's  partisans  and  of 
their  intentions  to  "fake"  the  election,  that  I  engaged 
a  fighting  army  of  two  hundred  men,  and  let  it  be 
known  publicly  that  I  should  see  that  no  nonsense  took 
place  at  the  ballot-boxes,  or  that  we  should  show  fight. 
My  men  had  instructions  from  me  to  rush  the  whole 
concern  out  of  the  window  of  the  voting-room  on  the 
slightest  sign  of  trickery.  Monsieur  Constans,  on  the 
other  hand,  through  his  agents,  engaged  three  hundred 
ruffians,  including  many  inotichards.  These  were  paid 
to  interrupt  my  meetings  and  thus  to  give,  on  the  first 
opportunity,  a  pretext  for  arresting  me. 

"  On  Saturday,  October  5,  we  had  organized  great 
meetings  in  one  of  the  public  halls  of  the  town.  Mon- 
sieur Constans  had  been  invited  to  attend,  and  we  had 
promised  to  see  that  he  should  be  respected.  He  did 
not  come,  however.  But  about  nine  o'clock,  just  as  I 
was  addressing  the  meeting,  the  Constans  gang  came 
along  outside  and  began  beating  "  La  Generale "  on 
their  drums.  This  was  the  signal  of  attack.  At  the 
same  time  these  fellows  began  to  storm  the  meeting- 
room.  The  windows  were  smashed  in  with  bludgeons, 
and  the  riot  was  so  great  that  it  was  impossible  for  me 
to  continue  speaking.  I  therefore  went  out  into  the 
street  accompanied  by  my  men,  who  were  armed  with 
sticks.  At  the  door  I  saw  that  the  crowd  of  Monsieur 
Constans's  ruffians  were  so  menacing  that  with  the 
object  of  showing  them  that  I  intended  to  stand  no 
nonsense,  I  drew  my  revolver  and  walked  along,  holding 
it  in  my  hand.  I  had  not  gone  three  paces  before  four 
men  sprang  on  me  and  arrested  me.  One  of  these  men 
was  a  policeman  in  uniform.  I  therefore  made  no 
resistance,  but  asked  the  constable  why  I  was  being 
arrested.     He  replied  that  it   was  because  I  had  drawn 


292  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

my  revolver.  Just  then  one  of  the  crowd  lunged  iit 
me  with  .i  spike  at  the  end  of  a  stick.  He  missed  me, 
however,  but  wounded  one  of  the  four  fellows  who  were 
hauling  me  off. 

"  I  was  taken  to  prison,  and  in  direct  violation  of 
the  law,  which  ordains  that  during  election-time 
tribunals  shall  be  permanently  in  session,  was  kept 
in  gaol  for  two  days.  On  Sunday  I  insisted  on  being 
told  on  what  charge  I  was  being  held.  I  was  told 
that  it  was  on  a  charge  of  wilful  murder  against  a  police 
officer — a  charge  which,  in  France,  might  entail  the 
death  penalty.  It  has  since  come  to  my  knowledge  that 
on  that  very  same  Sunday  the  Prefect  of  the  department 
sent  for  the  magistrate  who  was  to  try  my  case,  and 
told  him  that  if  he  did  not  treat  me  with  all  the  rigour 
of  the  law  he  would  run  the  risk  of  getting  bounced 
from  his  post.  The  magistrate  in  question  dared  the 
Prefect  to  make  that  statement  before  witnesses,  and 
added  that  he  should  act  as  he  thought  right  and  just  and 
not  otherwise.  When  my  trial  came  off,  a  day  or  two  ago, 
the  charge  of  attempted  murder  was  abandoned.  Mon- 
sieur Constans  having  been  successful  in  getting  elected 
could  afford  to  be  merciful.  The  other  charge  was, 
however,  vigorously  supported  by  a  number  of  false 
witnesses,  who  lied  in  a  shameful  manner.  Their  case 
was,  however,  too  weak,  and  the  trial  resulted  in  my 
being  fined  four  pounds." 

Six  years  previously  the  Marquis  had  been  tried 
at  Bismarck,  in  Dakota,  for  the  murder  of  a  man  called 
Luffey,  alias  Luftus  Riley,  alias  Luffsey,  one  of  a  gang 
of  horse  thieves  and  desperadoes  whose  enmity  he 
had  incurred  by  the  war  he  had  waged  upon  them. 
On  June  26,  1883,  the  thieves  surrounded  his  house, 
and   a   desperate  fight  took  place,  during  which  Luffey 


DE    MORES'S   TRIAL   FOR    MURDER     293 

fell  mortally  wounded.  The  Marquis  could  not  say 
whether  he  or  which  of  his  men  had  fired  the  fatal 
shot,  but  it  was  the  Marquis  who  was  held  responsible 
for  the  killing  of  the  man,  and  took  his  trial  for  murder. 
It  lasted  seventeen  days,  and  in  the  end  he  was 
acquitted. 

It  often  occurred  to  me,  though,  that  the  thought  that 
he  had  killed  a  man  haunted  the  Marquis's  mind,  and 
that  he  was  not  a  happy  man  after  that  fatal  day.  He 
was  an  absolutely  dead  shot.  On  the  eve  of  his  duel  in 
Belgium  with  Camille  Dreyfus  he  told  me  exactly 
what  he  was  going  to  do  to  his  man.  "  I  shall  let 
him  fire  first,"  he  said,  "  and  then,  unless  he  puts  me 
hors  de  combat,  I  shall  fire  just  as  he  is  dropping 
his  pistol  arm  and  break  it  for  him.  I  will  put  a  stop 
for  a  while  to  his  writing  impudent  libels  about  me." 
And  that  is  exactly  what  he  did.  Camille  Dreyfus  had 
attacked  the  Marquis  in  the  Radical  for  his  professions 
of  Anti-Semitism.  The  phrase  which  provoked  the 
Marquis's  cartel  was  to  the  effect  that  a  man  who  had 
married  a  Jewess  ought  not  to  spit  on  the  Jew-father's 
beard.  The  devoted  Marquise  de  Mores  was  a  daughter 
of  Mr.  Louis  von  Hoffmann,  the  banker,  of  New  York. 

Mores  used  to  carrya  loaded  stick,  with  a  ball  of  iron 
filled  with  lead,  weighing  over  twenty  pounds,  as  the  knob. 
He  called  it  his  "  training  stick,"  and  he  said  that  it  kept 
his  wrist  in  good  form.  It  was  a  little  joke  of  his  on  first 
meeting  a  man  to  ask  him  to  hold  his  stick  for  him,  and 
he  used  to  laugh  when  the  weight  of  it  pulled  the  man's 
hand  down.  I  saw  him  very  often,  and  frequently 
accompanied  him  to  political  meetings.  He  was  a  most 
eloquent  speaker.  I  remember  that  once  he  had  appointed 
me  to  fetch  him  in  a  club  brougham  from  the  Cerclc 
Royale,  but  when  I  got  there  I   was  told  he  was  playing 


294  TWFXTV   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

eairt6.      I   was  asked   to  come    lor    him   an    hour   later. 
However,  the  party  lastcil  all  that  night  and  late  into  the 
next  day.      I  do  not  think,  though,  that  he  was  habitually 
a  gambler.      One  day  he  left  at  my  house  a  cutting  from 
a  New  York  paper,   with   a   huge   note  of  interrogation 
written  upon  it  in  blue  pencil.      It  was  a  cable  despatch 
of  mine  in  which  the  foreign  sub-editor  had  expanded  a 
line  saying  that  I  had  met  the   Marquis  and  that  he  had 
been  very  ill,  into  a  statement  that  the  Marquis,  worn  out 
with  debauch,   might  be    considered    as    played   out.      I 
immediately  wrote  to  him  to  say  that,  being  a  rabid  Anti- 
Semite,  he  must  not  expect  much  mercy  at  the  hands  of 
the  Jewish  sub-editors,  and   I   enclosed  my  carbon  copy 
of  the  original  cablegram.      His  Anti-Semitism,   I   think, 
proceeded  from  the  fact  that  on  more  than  one  occasion, 
both    in    Cochin-China   and    in    America,    he   had   been 
beaten  in  commercial  undertakings  by  Jewish  financiers. 
It  will  be  remembered  that  it  was  he  who,  when  Barney 
Barnato  came  to  Paris  in  connection  with  the  floating  of 
some  of  his  companies,  brought  a  gang  of  men  to  the 
Place    Vendome    and    forced   Barnato    to    flee  from  the 
Bristol  Hotel. 

One  day  after  I  had  been  lunching  with  him  and  the 
Comte  de  Mun  at  the  house  of  the  Marquis  de  Breteuil, 
and  as  Breteuil  and  I  were  walking  with  him  up  the  Rue 
Royale,  he  suddenly  hurried  us  down  the  Rue  St.  Honore. 
We  had  been  walking  to  the  Jockey  Club,  and  Breteuil 
asked  what  was  the  meaning  of  this  dchappde  a  gauche. 
"  Didn't  you  see  Hirsch  coming  along  .-^ "  he  said.      "  He 

is  with ,  and  he  would  have  taken  my  salute  to 

as  partly  intended  for  him,  and  would  have  returned 
my  bow.  It  would  be  a  pretty  spectacle,  would  it  not, 
the  Marquis  de  Mores  and  the  Baron  von  Hirsch 
exchanging  bows  1 " 


WEDDED,   YET   SINGLE  295 

I  am  wondering  whether  I  ought  to  mention,  amongst 
the  princes  and    potentates    whom    I   have   known,  the 

notorious  L W •,  who  is  at  present  in  a  Belgian 

gaol.  When  I  was  brought  into  contact  with  him,  he 
had  just  distinguished  himself  in  the  following  way : 
he  had  become  engaged  to  be  married  to  Mademoiselle 

F ,  the  daughter  of  the  Consul-General  of  one  of  the 

southern  monarchies.  His  real  character  was  not  then 
known  to  the  girl's  father,  although  that  gentleman 
appreciated  the  fact  fully  that  it  is  an  expensive  luxury  to 

call  a  prince  son-in-law.      L W ,  however,  did 

not  think  that  the  Consul  had  been  sufficiently  liberal  in 
the  way  of  marriage  settlements,  or,  perhaps,  he  saw  a 
way  of  getting  a  considerable  sum  in  ready  cash.  The 
fact  remains  that,  after  the  civil  wedding  at  the  mairie, 
he  went  to  his  father-in-law,  and  having  concocted  some 
story  to  account  for  his  urgent  need  of  the  sum, 
demanded  ^4,000.  The  Consul  answered  that  he 
had    already    paid    quite    enough    for    the    honour    of 

seeing  his  daughter  Princess  of   L W .     The 

Prince  insisted,  a  quarrel  arose,  and  finally  the  young 
man  went  off  swearing  that  unless  the  money  were  paid 
him  before  the  morrow,  he  should  not  attend  the  religious 
service  at  the  Madeleine.  The  money  was  not  sent,  the 
Prince  did  not  come,  and  the  poor  bride  had  to  return 
home,  married  in  the  eyes  of  the  law,  but  in  the  eyes  of 
the  Catholic  Church  and  her  own  unwedded.  A  stormy 
scene  ensued  between  the  Consul  and  the  Prince,  for  the 
girl's  father  rushed  to  the  young  man's  rooms  to  have  an 
explanation.      It   was   reported    that    a   bout   of  fisticuffs 

took  place.     After  that  L W disappeared  from 

Paris,  and  for  quite  a  long  time  one  used  to  meet  in 
society  the  girl  who  was  married,  but  who  was  not  a  wife. 
She  used  to  be  known  as  Mademoiselle .     The  great 


296  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

difficulty  in  the  wdy  of  a  solution  of  the  matter  was  that 
her  family,  being  staunch  Catholics,  could  not  refer  to  the 
courts  to  dissolve  the  civil  marriage.  In  the  end  release 
came  from  Rome,  and  permission  was  granted  to  the  girl 
to  sue  for  divorce,  to  unloosen  by  civil  remedy  a  civil  tie. 
The  Prince,  whose  name  figured  in  ihiiAh/iafiac  dc  Gotha, 
soon  developed  into  one  of  the  most  notorious  criminals 
in  Europe. 

Of  matrimonial  difficulties  between  American  girls 
who  had  married  foreign  princes  or  noblemen  I  was  a 
constant  spectator  for  years,  and  I  have  never  ceased  to 
impress  upon  American  readers  the  folly  and  risks  of 
such  marriages,  in  which  the  young  brides,  victims  of 
their  own  foolish  ambitions,  are  plundered,  ill-used,  and 
abandoned  for  mistresses  kept  on  their  fathers'  dollars. 
I  remember  one  case,  however,  where  an  American  girl 
of  great  wealth  was  saved  by  her  business  instincts  from 
a  marriage  which  would  certainly  have  been  an  unhappy 

one.     This  was  Miss  C ,  of  Philadelphia.     She  had 

become  engaged  to  the  late  Prince  Murat,  who  was 
many  years  her  senior,  and  who  was  marrying  again 
because  the  gambling-table  had  almost  entirely  ruined 
him. 

On  the  eve  of  the  marriage,  as  is  the  custom  in 
France,  the  marriage  contract  was  read  in  public  at  the 
bride's  house.  After  various  clauses  describing  the  vast 
wealth  which  was  being  brought   into  the  marriage  by 

Miss  C ,  the  notary  came  to  the  clause  dealing  with 

the  allowance  of  pin-money  which  was  to  be  made  out  of 

the  settlement  to  the  Prince.     Miss  C had  fixed  this 

at  two  thousand  pounds  a  year.  When  Murat  heard  the 
figure  he  went  scarlet  with  indignation.  Springing  from 
his  chair,  he  signed  to  the  lawyer  to  stop  his  reading, 
and,  walking  up  to  his  bride,  cried  out  in  presence  of  all 


A   MARRIAGE    OF    REASON  297 

the  company  assembled  :  "Surely,  madame,  this  is  a  joke  ! 
You  cannot   be   in  earnest  in  treating  your  prospective 

husband  with  such  suspicion  ?"     Miss  C ,  in  a  very 

cool,  business-like  tone,  reminded  the  Prince  that  ever 
since  the  question  of  marriage  was  first  mooted  between 
them,  she  had  declared  that  she  would  keep  the  manage- 
ment ;of  her  millions  in  her  own  hands.  "  Prince,"  she 
added,  "  I  have  managed  my  fortune  all  along  with 
success,  and  I  wish  to  continue  to  do  so.  As  for  you, 
you  have  shown  that  you  do  not  know  how  to  manage 
money."  "  If  you  are  indeed  in  earnest,"  said  Murat, 
•'all  I  can  say  is  that  fifty  thousand  francs  a  year  might 
be  a  sufficient  allowance  for  your  maitre-a  hotel,  but  is 
certainly  not  enough  for  your  husband."  With  these 
words  he  walked  out  of  the  room,  nor  did  he  omit  to 
slam  the  door  violently  behind  him,  leaving  the  wedding- 
party  in  consternation. 

Miss  C would  not  give  way,  and  on  the  other 

hand  the  Prince's  daughter-in-law,  who  had  not  at  all 
relished  the  prospect  of  there  being  another  Princess 
Murat,  offered  to  allow  her  father-in-law  the  fifty 
thousand  francs  a  year  if  he  would  forego  the  marriage. 
But  not  only  the  Prince's  daughter-in-law,  who  was  the 
granddaughter  of  the  great  Marshal  Ney,  and  who 
possessed  great  social  power  and  influence  in  Paris, 
violently  opposed  the  match  ;  so  also-  did  the  whole  of 
the  Murat  and  Bonaparte  families.  I  remember  that 
Princess  Mathilde  spoke  out  in  no  ambiguous  language 

against  such  a  mesalliance.     Miss  C ,  whose  conduct 

I  immensely  admired  throughout,  never  moved  from  the 
position  she  had  taken  up.  After  the  rupture  at  the 
reading  of  the  contract,  she  informed  the  Prince  that  her 
offer  would  remain  open  for  a  fortnight.  During  that 
period  the  promised  spouses  frequently  met  outside,  but 


298  TWT-XTV   VHARS    IN    PARIS 

the  Prince  useJ  to  pass  the  lady  with  no  sign  of  recog- 
nition.    When    the    fortnight    had   elapsed,  Miss  C 

took  c.ibins  for  herself  and  her  suite,  and  departed  for 
America,  leaving  Murat  to  find  a  less  wealthy  but  also 
less  prudent  princess. 

At  about  the  same  time  there  was  another  prince 
of  high  lineage  in  the  matrimonial  market,  a  French 
prince — dead  since — bearing  a  historic  name.  He  had 
long  been  known  to  us  as  a  loafer  in  the  bars  and  cafds. 
He  was  an  elderly  man  and  a  very  shabby  one,  and  one 
dreaded  meeting  him,  for  he  was  as  persistent  as 
Coppee's  vieux  Polonais  in  levying  five-franc  pieces. 
One  day,  however,  he  turned  up  dressed  in  new  clothes 
from  head  to  foot.  He  did  not  offer  to  pay  off  his 
debts,  but  at  any  rate  he  was  able  to  discharge  his 
drinking-bill  at  the  caf^  that  night  without  recourse  to 
others.  It  appeared  that  the  wife  of  a  rich  tailor  had 
long  had  her  eye  on  the  destitute  Prince,  and  ^is  her 
husband  was  dying  she  had  made  up  her  mind  that  ii 
money  could  effect  her  purpose  she  would  become 
Madame  la  Princesse.  As  soon  as  the  tailor  was  dead, 
and  indeed  before  the  breath  was  well  out  of  his  body, 
she    sent    her    lawyer    to    the    garret    where  the   Prince 

de was  living,  and  made  him  an  offer   of  marriage. 

He  greedily  accepted  the  offer ;  an  allowance  was  at 
once  settled  on  him  by  his  prospective  wife,  and  carte 
blanche  was  given  him  to  fit  himself  out  at  the  shop. 
The  widow  kept  him  in  luxury  until  the  proper  time 
of  mourning  for  her  first  husband  had  elapsed,  and  then 
married  him.  I  do  not  know  whether  the  marriage 
was  a  happy  one  or  not,  but  I  do  not  fancy  that  the 
Princess  saw  much  of  his  company.  He  seemed  to 
spend  his  time  between  the  American  bar  at  the  Grand 
Hotel  and  one  or  other  of  the  clubs   where  they  play 


A    PRINCE   AMONG   COOKS  299 

baccarat.  He  assumed  an  attitude  of  great  haughtiness 
towards  his  former  acquaintances.  Not  one  of  them 
dared  to  remind  him  of  the  trifling  loan  accounts  that 
were  outstanding. 

This  scullion  amongst  princes  reminds  me  by  con- 
trast of  a  prince  amongst  cooks.  I  refer  to  the  late 
Joseph,  Joseph  the  immortal,  of  Joseph's  restaurant  in 
Paris  and  of  the  Savoy  Hotel  in  London.  He  had 
long  been  known  to  the  gourmets  of  polite  society  as 
the  chef  at  Paillard's  in  the  Chaussee  d'Antin,  but  what 
made  his  name  world  famous  was  the  news  that  he  had 
been  engaged  as  cook  by  Mr.  W.  K.  Vanderbilt  at  a 
salary  of  ten  thousand  dollars  a  year.  That  was  in 
March,  1887.  I  remember  calling  on  Monsieur  Joseph 
Dugnol.  He  used  to  live  in  a  small  apartment  in  the 
Rue  des  Jeuneurs — a  queer  address  certainly  for  a  man 
who  catered  for  the  gourmandise  of  the  nations. 

His  wife  was  much  opposed  to  the  voyage  to 
America.  "  No  good  could  come  of  it,"  she  said. 
Joseph  told  me  that  day  that  he  was  not  going  to 
America  as  a  cook,  that  he  spurned  the  designation. 
"  I  am,"  he  said,  "  a  gastronomical  director."  New 
York  was  hugely  amused  at  my  cable  in  which  I  made 
this  announcement.  Vanderbilt's  acquisition  became 
the  talk  of  the  town.  Unfortunately  the  attention  of  the 
Immigration  Bureau  was  attracted,  and  when  Joseph 
and  his  family  arrived  an  attempt  was  made  to  detain 
him  as  imported  labour.  Vanderbilt,  however,  was  able 
to  dispose  of  that  difficulty. 

Some  days  after  my  visit  to  the  Rue  des  Jeuneurs, 
Joseph  called  at  my  house  and  told  me  his  story.  He 
had  been  cook  in  the  kitchens  of  the  Palace  in  Berlin 
under  old  Emperor  William.  "It  used  to  break  my 
heart,"    he    said,     "  when    the     Kaiser    sent    back    my 


300  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

magnificent  fancy  dishes  untouched,  and  would  eat  nothing 
but  plain  (ood.      I  was  miserable;   in  the  royal  kitchens." 
Speaking  of  how  Vanderbilt  came  to   engage   him,  he 
said:   "Mr.    Vanderbilt    came   to   the    Cafe    Bignon   one 
day,    and    I    served    him   a    nice    little   dinner    of  three 
courses.      He  said  :   'You  must  come  to  New  York  with 
me.'     I   said   that    I   could   not,  and  the  matter  dropped 
for  a  while.       Then  he   came   back   one   day   with    his 
wife,    and    asked   me   to    cook   him  a   wild  duck.     You 
know   my   speciality,    the   cayiard  sauvage   a    la  presse. 
After  dinner   the   subject  of  my  going  to  America  was 
acrain    broached,  and   this    time    he   offered  such   liberal 
terms  that   I   could   refuse   no   longer.      I   am  to    report 
at  Mr.  Vanderbilt's  house  in  New  York  on  April  i.      I 
owe  my  success  to  having  learned  to  please  the  stomach 
through  the  imagination.     A  man   can  only  eat  a  small 
quantity  at  one  meal,  and  it  is  a  mistake   to  set  before 
him    a   bill    of    fare    which    overloads    his  stomach  and 
surfeits  him.     A    soup,  an  eyitrde,  and  one   other  dish, 
that  is  my    dinner,   with   a  few  airy  trifles  to  complete 
it.      I  learned  simplicity  in    Emperor  William's   kitchen. 
I    please  the   refined    palate  by  giving  simple  fare  deli- 
cately cooked.     The  few  ingredients  necessary  to  qualify 
each  dish  are  brought  into  high  relief     Each   dish  must 
be   so   tastefully  prepared  as    to  appeal  to  the  eye  and 
not  to  fatigue  the  stomach — that's  the  secret  of  successful 
cooking.      Mr.  Blaine  once  made  me  an  offer  to  go  out 
to    America  with  him,   but   it   was  a  half-hearted  offer, 
and  he  did  not  hold  out  sufficient  inducements." 

He  then  said  that  he  could  show  me  how  for  a 
trifling  cost  an  exquisite  dish  could  be  made,  and  sent 
my  servant  out  to  fetch  him  two  halfpenny  oranges  and 
a  penny  bunch  of  violets.  He  transformed  the  two 
oranges   into  dainty  little  panzers,  which   he    decorated 


HE    DEMONSTRATES    HIS   ART         301 

as  to  their  handles  with  violets.  The  pulp  of  the  orange 
he  scooped  out,  pressed  the  juice  into  a  cup,  mixed  it 
with  sugar,  and  added  to  it  a  few  drops  of  liqueur. 
"  Put  that  into  a  freezing  safe  for  a  few  minutes," 
he  said,  "  and  you  have  at  the  cost  of  three  half- 
pence each  a  panier  a  la  Sevignd,  or  a  la  anything 
else,  for  which  a  fashionable  restaurateur  could  charge 
a  shilling  at  least.  Whilst  he  was  deftly  preparing  this 
entremets,  he  was  telling  me  of  a  fight  he  once  had 
with  the  gloves  with  the  late  Marquis  of  Queensberry, 
"  in  which,"  he  said,  "  I  proved  to  his  Grace  that  a 
skilful  French  boxer  can  soon  knock  a  Britisher  out  of 
time."  He  told  me  that  besides  boxing,  and  all  other 
kinds  of  athletics,  he  was  very  fond  of  waltzing  and 
greatly  interested  in  astronomy. 

His  visit  to  New  York  was  not  a  success.  He  soon 
returned  to  Europe.  "  The  psychology  of  Monsieur 
Vanderbilt  and  my  own,"  he  explained,  "  are  not  the 
same."  His  restaurant  was  not  very  successful.  He 
told  me  that  to  start  a  first-class  restaurant  in  Paris 
with  any  chances  of  success,  a  man  must  be  prepared 
to  sink  at  least  ten  thousand  pounds  in  his  wine-cellar. 
He  was  hampered  by  want  of  capital,  and  so  eventually 
accepted  an  offer  from  the  Savoy  Hotel.  Here  he 
earned  a  large  sum  of  money,  and  after  some  years 
returned  to  Paris  to  develop  his  restaurant.  But  then 
he  fell  ill  and  died.  His  estate  exceeded  one  hundred 
thousand  pounds,  every  penny  of  which  he  had  earned 
with  his  spits  and  spoons.  He  was  a  wonderful  little 
man  and  I  felt  his  loss.  I  used  to  address  him  as  cker 
maitre ;  and  indeed  many  of  the  things  that  I  know  about 
gastronomy  and  wines  I  owe  to  the  lessons  he  used 
to  give  me  while  I  was  dining  at  his  restaurant. 

Joseph,    in    his   way,    was  an  apostle  of  the  simple 


302  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

life.  He  stood  for  simplicity  in  luxury.  He  cultivated 
the  oourmct  ami  abhorred  the  j^ourmand.  Brillat- 
Savarin,  the  mao;istrate  and  epicure,  would  have  taken 
him  to  his  bosom.  It  was  in  the  irony  of  Fate  that 
he  should  have  been  cut  off  in  his  prime.  Such  cooking 
as  his  should  have  led  him  to  extreme  old  ae^e.  In 
which  connection,  one  word  about  Monsieur  Eugene 
Chevreul,  the  savant,  whose  acquaintance  I  made  that 
same  year,  when  he  was  one  hundred  and  two  years 
old.  He  told  me  that  he  attributed  his  longevity  to 
the  moderation  of  his  eating  and  drinking.  "  And,"  he 
said,  "  I  think  that  I  have  found  the  secret  of  eternal 
youth  in  the  plate  of  bouillon,  which  I  take  every  night 
for  my  last  meal.  It  is  just  pot-aii-feu  soup,  with 
vermicelli  in  it,  and  to  this  I  add  a  spoonful  of  grated 
Gruyere  cheese.  I  consider  this  my  most  wonderful 
discovery.  It  is  the  ideal  nourishment.  It  feeds  and 
it  stimulates." 

I  have  often  wondered  why  it  is  impossible  in 
England  to  obtain  the  A^\<i\o\x'=>  pot-au-feu  bouillon  which 
is  the  staple  of  the  French  table.  It  is  easy  of  pre- 
paration, and  it  is  indeed,  as  old  Monsieur  Chevreul 
said,  an  ideal  food,  when  added  to  in  the  way  he 
described.  Amongst  soups  it  is  incontestably  the  first.* 
*  My  housekeeper,  who  has  a  city  reputation  for  the  excellence 
of  her  pot-au-feu^  gives  me  the  following  recipe  for  its  preparation. 
One  quart  of  water  should  be  allowed  for  every  pound  of  meat. 
The  best  meat  for  the  purpose  is  from  the  hind-hock  of  the  ox.  An 
earthenware  pot,  or  marmite^  is  preferable,  but  an  iron  saucepan  can 
be  used  just  as  well.  The  meat  is  to  be  put  into  the  water  cold, 
with  a  sufficiency  of  salt.  Let  it  boil  and  then  skim  as  long  as  scum 
rises.  You  then  add  the  vegetables.  There  should  be  a  quarter  of 
a  pound  of  mixed  vegetables  to  every  pound  of  meat.  The  vegetables 
to  be  used  are  carrots,  leeks,  onions,  and  one  turnip.  For  seasoning 
add  at  the  same  time  a  clove,  a  small  pod  of  garlic,  and  a  little  bouquet 
of  celery  and  parsley  tied  together.    Use  no  pepper.    The  bouillon  should 


GENERAL   TCHENG-KI-TONG 


0^0 


I  must  not  conclude  my  list  of  princes  and  potentates 
without  mentioning  the  name  of  Marquis  and  General 
Tcheng-Ki-Tong,  for  some  time  charge  d'affaires  at 
the  Imperial  Chinese  Embassy  in  Paris.  Tcheng-Ki- 
Tong  was  a  Parisianized  Oriental  of  a  very  peculiar 
type.  He  was  a  man  of  literary  tastes,  and  contributed 
largely  on  Chinese  subjects  to  the  leading  French  papers. 
He  was  the  author  of  a  number  of  books  on  Chinese 
questions.  At  the  same  lime  he  was  ardently  attached 
to  the  pleasures  of  the  capital.  It  was  said  of  him, 
after  his  disgrace,  that  tacking  up  his  pig-tail  under  his 
hat,  and  in  European  costume,  he  used  to  attend  the 
public  halls  and  dance  as  wildly  the  cancan  as  any 
Valentin-le-Desosse  of  them  all.  He  got  into  trouble 
on  a  charge  of  raising  money  on  the  security  of  his 
Government  without  authority.  A  London  newspaper 
was  mainly  responsible  for  the  campaign  which  ended 
in  his  recall.  There  was  a  time  when  his  friends  in 
Paris  had  grave  reasons  to  fear  for  poor  Tcheng-Ki- 
Tong.  It  was  announced  that  he  had  been  entrapped 
into  returning  to  Pekin,  and  that  there  anything  but  a 
cordial  welcome  awaited  him.  A  Chinese  official  with 
whom  I  conversed  on  the  subject  of  his  probable  destiny 
said  that  it  was  very  likely  that,  as  his  personal  safety 
had  been  promised  to  him  before  he  returned  home, 
he  would  be  appointed  to  the  governorship  of  some 
remote  province,  and  that  he  would  never  be  heard 
of  again  after  once  he  had  set  off  to  reach  his  seat  of 
government. 

"  II  y  a  des  bandits  et  des  assassins  partout,"  said 

boil  on  a  slow  fire  for  five  hours.  Then  remove  the  meat  and  pass  the 
bouillon  through  a  strainer.  In  France  some  of  the  vegetables  are 
sometimes  served  with  the  soup  or  are  eaten  with  the  meat,  as  a  separate 
dish.     But  with  that  I  have  nothing  to  do. 


304  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

the  Chiii;iin;m  who  w.is  spcakini^  to  inc,  ami  his  cyos 
twinkled  at  thi'  thought  how  cunningly  the  trap  had 
been  bailetl.  lUit  in  the  matter  of  wiliness,  Tchcng-Ki- 
Tong  was  more  than  a  match  for  his  adversaries.  Me 
escaped  all  dangers  and  became  the  righthand  man 
of  Li-Hung-Tchang.  I  had  excellent  accounts  of  him, 
during  a  visit  to  Stockholm,  from  vSven  Hedin,  the 
Swedish  traveller,  who  had  dined  with  him  at  Li-Hung- 
Tchang's  table  in  Pekin.  He  rose  to  great  wealth  and 
honours,  and  may  yet  be  seen  once  more  in  great 
splendour  on  the  boulevards  which  he  loved  so  well. 
I  often  used  to  call  on  him  at  the  Embassy,  and 
while  we  talked  of  literature  he  used  to  regale  me  on 
Chinese  tea,  which  was  scented  with  all  kinds  of  fragrant 
blossoms,  and  which  was  of  the  colour  of  palest  amber. 
With  the  tea  he  used  to  hand  me  a  Chinese  pipe,  from 
which  one  drew  one  whiff,  and  no  more,  and  which  had 
to  be  filled  and  lighted  again  for  a  second  draw.  I 
translated  into  English  one  of  his  books  on  life  and 
customs  in  China,  and  gained  for  the  while  a  reputation 
as  an  erudite  Oriental  linguist.  The  patent  fact  that 
the  book  had  been  translated  from  the  French  was  over- 
looked. In  no  dissimilar  way  are  reputations  often  made. 
Whilst  I  was  working  at  this  book  we  were  constantly 
together,  and  I  conceived  much  regard  'for  the  kindness 
and  cleverness  of  the  man 


CHAPTER  XIX 

The  Foreign  Correspondent — "  News,  not  Soul-throb  " — Yellow  Journalism 
— A  Cable  from  Keats — The  Fascination  of  the  Work — The  Precarious- 
ness  of  Position — On  collecting  "Personals" — Shadowing  a  Millionaire 
— Jules  Verne  and  Nelly  Bly — My  Friendship  with  Jules  Verne — The 
Paris  Correspondent  to  English  Papers — The  Fight  against  Anonymity 
— The  Jealousy  of  Colleagues — A  Remonstrance  with  Zola — American 
and  Enghsh  Correspondence  Contrasted— Wanted,  the  Power  of 
Prophecy — How  I  missed  a  High  Honour. 

IT  was  by  mere  accident  that  having  come  to  Paris  to 
lead  a  life  devoted  to  literature  and  to  study,  and 
to  seek  the  companionship  and  instruction  of  the  great 
minds  in  the  capital  of  the  world's  intellect,  I  was  drawn 
into  the  vortex  of  journalism.  I  had  had  no  training  for 
this  life  ;  my  sympathies  were  altogether  elsewhere  ; 
I  was  at  home  rather  in  the  study  than  in  the  ante- 
chambers of  notoriety  ;  it  has,  indeed,  always  been  only 
by  a  strong  effort  that  I  have  been  able  to  bring  myself 
to  those  acts  of  importuning  others  which  the  profession 
of  reporter  exacts.  For  the  foreign  correspondent  is,  in 
the  first  place,  a  reporter.  He  may  object  to  the  qualifi- 
cation ;  he  may  point  out  that  he  is  a  political  writer,  that 
theatrical  and  literary  criticism  come  within  the  range  of 
his  duties,  and  that  as  a  chronicler  of  the  modes  and 
diversions  of  the  highest  society  he  is  essentially  a  man 
of  the  world.  All  that  is  true,  but  the  fact  remains  that 
he  is,  or  should  be,  in  priinis,  a  reporter  of  news,  and  I 
attribute  such  success  as   I   attained  in   my  career  to  the 

305  20 


3o6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

fact  tli.il  1  alw.ivs  ki'j)t  this  truth  well  bt^lorc:  my  eyes. 
It  was  Mr.  Pulit/er,  of  the  Neiu  York  Worlds  who 
impressed  the  fact  upon  me  that  a  "  nose  for  news  "  is 
the  foremost  qualification  of  the  successful  journalist. 
The  astonishing  heights  of  power  and  wealth  to  which 
my  first  preceptor  has  raised  himself  from  mediocre 
beginnings  invest  his  teaching  with  peculiar  value. 

One  day,  some  years  after  my  first  arrival  in  Paris  as 
a  resident,  I  fell  into  conversation  in  a  cafd  in  the  Rue 
de  Castiglione  with  an  American  gentleman,  who  informed 
me  in  the  course  of  his  remarks  that  he  was  the  London 
correspondent  of  a  great  American  daily.  He  asked  me 
what  my  profession  was,  and  when  I  told  him  that  I  was 
a  writer,  he  expressed  a  desire  to  see  some  specimens  of 
my  work.  That  evening  I  showed  him  one  of  my  scrap- 
books.  He  examined  its  contents  carefully,  and,  said  he  : 
"  Well,  yes,  the  spelling  and  the  grammar  seem  all  right. 
But,"  he  added,  "  it's  news,  and  not  soul-throb,  that  we 
desiderate."  He  then  asked  me  if  I  would  care  to  act  as 
correspondent  in  Paris  for  his  journal.  The  novelty  of 
the  suggestion  attracted  me  ;  the  inducements  held  out 
were  tempting,  and  that  evening  I  found  myself  invested 
with  the  title  and  dignity  of  Paris  correspondent.  I 
remember  that  the  very  next  day  I  was  reminded  how 
little  vanity  I  could  derive  from  the  appointment.  I  was 
at  a  big  dinner-party  at  a  house  in  the  Pare  Monceau 
Quarter,  and  during  the  course  of  the  evening  my  friend 
Coquelin  cadet,  the  actor,  introduced   me  to  a  lady,  the 

Comtesse  de    T ,    as    Paris    correspondent    of    the 

.     "  So  delighted  to  make  your  acquaintance," 

she  said,  and,  fibbing,  added  :  "  Monsieur  Coquelin  has 
told  me  of  your  great  talents  as  a  journalist."  "  Yes, 
madame,"  I  said,  "  I  spell  quite  satisfactorily."  At 
that  dinner-party  there  were  present  a  number  of  most 


A    SANDRINGHAM    PROFESSOR         307 

distinguished  people,  actors,  writers,  painters,  and  finan- 
ciers. Amongst  the  guests  was  a  lady  who  had  acted  as 
professor  of  music  at  Sandringham.  When  on  the  fol- 
lowing morning  I  told  the  London  correspondent  of  the 
dinner-party,  and  about  the  people  who  had  been  present, 
he  said  that  he  hoped  that  I  had  taken  advantage  of  the 
fact  that  I  had  sat  next  to  the  music  mistress  of  the  royal 
princes  and  princesses  to  get  a  good  "  story  "  of  what 
went  on  at  Sandringham.  When  I  told  him  that  I  had 
done  nothing  of  the  sort,  he  shook  his  head,  and  said 
that  he  feared  that  he  had  been  mistaken  in  me. 

I  remember  that  directly  after  receiving  this  appoint- 
ment, I  was  in  negotiation  for  a  room  on  the  seventh 
floor  of  a  house  in  the  Rue  de  Castiglione.  I  had  still  the 
romantic  idea  that  the  profession  of  letters  is  best  pursued  in 
a  garret.  The  proprietress  of  the  house  was  a  very  old 
lady  who  prided  herself  on  her  likeness  to  Queen  Amelie, 
and  who  dressed  in  such  a  way  as  to  heighten  the 
resemblance.  Before  making  out  the  lease,  she  asked 
me  my  profession,  and  when  I  told  her  that  I  had  become 
a  journalist  she  at  first  refused  to  have  me  as  a  tenant. 
"  Our  house  has  always  been  a  quiet  one.  I  should  not 
like  my  tenants  to  be  disturbed."  I  did  not  take  her 
meaning  until  she  continued  that  the  only  condition  on 
which  she  would  let  me  her  room  was  that  a  clause  should 
be  inserted  into  the  lease  to  the  effect  that  I  undertook 
at  no  time  to  erect  a  printing-press  in  the  apartment. 
I  mention  this  incident  as  it  illustrates  in  a  curious 
manner  the  idea  which  certain  bourgeois  in  Paris  still 
hold  of  the  meaning  of  the  word  journalist. 

The  London  correspondent's  remarks  on  what  ought 
to  have  been  my  preoccupation  during  the  dinner-party 
to  which  I  had  been  invited  as  an  ordinary  guest  gave 
me  a  disquieting  suggestion  of  what  might  be  expected 


3oS  TWRNTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

of  nic  as  a  corrcs[xnuU'iU  io  the  paper  in  question. 
I  should  explain  thai,  as  I  afterwards  learned,  this  par- 
ticular paper  was  one  of  the  pioneers  of  that  new 
journalism  which  later  became  known  as  the  "  Yellow 
Journalism."  "  We  are  a  democratic  paper,"  so  the  pro- 
prietor explained  to  me  when  we  met,  "and  what  we 
want  is  to  tomahawk  these  aristocrats."  I  came  to 
appreciate  the  fact  that  by  "  aristocrats  "  was  implied 
any  and  everybody  who  by  reason  of  talents,  or  wealth, 
or  social  position  might  be  supposed  to  excite  the  envy 
of  the  masses,  and  that  the  policy  of  the  paper  was 
to  ingratiate  itself  with  the  mob  by  pandering  to  this 
basest  of  passions.  I  need  hardly  say  that  at  no 
time  did  I  lend  myself  to  work  of  this  kind,  and  per- 
sistently refused  to  execute  such  orders  as  were  sometimes 
sent  me  either  direct  from  headquarters  or  from  the 
London  office  as  revolted  my  sense  of  what  was  fair 
and  decent. 

Amongst  such  orders  was  one  which  particularly 
excited  my  indignation.  A  letter  reached  me  from  the 
London  office  tellino^  me  that  a  certain  famous  and 
beautiful  actress  was  about  to  be  clandestinely  confined 
in  Paris,  and  ordering  me  to  find  out  all  about  the 
matter,  and  to  cable  two  columns  direct  to  New  York. 
I  telegraphed  back  that  if  the  lady  desired  her  confine- 
ment to  be  clandestine,  it  was  probably  because  she  did 
not  want  the  public  to  know  anything  about  it.  On 
another  occasion  I  was  sitting  in  the  pine-forest  near 
Cap  Breton  reading  Keats,  when  the  old  woman  who 
carried  telegrams  in  that  village  came  labouring  up  to 
me  with  a  blue  envelope  in  her  hand.  I  opened  it,  and 
found  that  it  was  a  request  from  a  New  York  editor  that 
I  would  "  cover  "  a  grand  "  story  "  of  which  they  had  just 
received  a   "  pointer."     Some    millionaire,    it   appeared, 


A   CABLE    FROM    KEATS  309 

who  had  disappeared  from  New  York,  was  then  known  to 
be  living  en  faux  manage  in  Paris,  What  was  desired 
of  me,  apparently,  was  that  I  should  go  to  Paris,  rout  out 
the  details  of  this  squalid  story,  and  publish  the  disgrace 
of  the  man  and  the  woman  to  the  world.  A  large  sum 
of  money  had  been  cabled  to  my  credit  at  a  bank  at 
Bayonne  to  cover  all  the  expenses  of  this  unworthy 
undertakinof.  It  seemed  to  me  then  as  thousfh  there  had 
come  upon  me  in  the  midst  of  the  beautiful  surroundings 
in  which  I  had  been  resting  some  loathsome  animal. 
"  Mother  Lacoste,"  I  said  to  the  old  woman,  "  how  dare 
you  bring  me  messages  like  this  ? "  A  few  minutes 
later  she  was  returning  to  the  village  with  a  telegraphic 
message  from  me  to  New  York,  which  I  had  copied, 
or  rather  adapted,  from  the  poem  I  had  been  reading 
when  I  was  interrupted  : 

There  is  a  mid-forest  laugh, 

Where  loiv  gives  the  half 

To  some  wight,  amazed  to  hear 
Jesting,  deep  in  forest  drear. 

Whenever  on  future  occasions  my  name  was  mentioned 
in  that  paper  in  New  York,  it  was  with  the  prefix 
"  the  outrageous." 

Even  the  ordinary  routine  work  of  collecting  "  per- 
sonals," i.e.  items  of  personal  information  about  prominent 
Americans  on  a  visit  to  Paris,  which  forms  an  important 
part  of  the  American  correspondent's  duties,  is  to  a 
person  who  is  at  all  sensitive  extremely  unpleasant  work. 
To  force  oneself  upon  strangers,  to  pester  them  with 
prying  and  impertinent  questions,  it  was  work  which  I 
could  not  do,  which  I  never  tried  to  do.  Had  it  not  been 
that,  thanks  to  my  extensive  relations  amongst  prominent 
people  in  Paris,  I  could  always  be  relied  upon  for  other 
news,   less  important  perhaps  to  the  Yellow  editor,  but 


3IO  T\\i;\  IV    \i:.\RS    1\    I'AKIS 

slill  unohlainahlc  elsewhere,  my  connection  with  that  class 
of  paper  would  not  have  been  a  lonj;  one.  It  may  he 
wondereil  why,  havinnr  such  scrujiles,  1  did  not  at  once 
resi^^n  a  jiosiiion  which  involved  such  duties.  Well,  in 
the  first  place,  1  never  ilid  violate  my  feelini;  ol  what  was 
decent  ;  and  in  the  second  place,  the  other  work  had  for 
me  an  intense  fascination.  I  know  few  satisfactions 
greater  than  those  which  1  used  to  experience  any 
mornint]^  after  I  had  sent  off  some  big  piece  of  news,  in 
the  feeling  that  a  whole  city,  thousands  and  thousands  of 
miles  away,  was  agog  with  what  I  had  written  ;  that  all 
New  York  or  San  Francisco  or  Chicago  was  discussing 
what  would  not  be  known  to  the  public  in  Paris  until  the 
agencies  had  cabled  my  information  back  to  Europe. 
One  is  lying  in  bed  quietly  smoking  cigarettes  and  sipping 
one's  coffee,  and  through  one's  agency,  by  reason  of 
something  that  one  did  but  a  few  hours  previously,  in 
places  thousands  of  miles  over  stormy  seas,  the  words,  the 
thoughts,  the  very  actions  of  hundreds  of  thousands  of 
men  and  women  are  being  controlled.  It  is  the  most 
imperial  sensation  of  power  that  can  come  to  any  man. 

It  was  not  the  fault  of  one's  editor  if  one  was  not 
always  kept  up  to  a  pitch  of  frenzy  in  the  collection 
of  news.  The  American  correspondent  is  always  on 
weekly  salary,  and  liable  to  dismissal  at  a  moment's 
notice.  One  of  my  editors  held  it  as  his  firm  opinion 
that  there  was  no  better  moral  tonic  for  a  correspondent 
who  was  getting  negligent  than  a  "year's  holiday  without 
salary."  After  a  period  of  want,  he  opined,  the  man 
would  come  back  with  energy  much  renewed  and 
faculties  considerably  sharpened.  No  past  services  are 
ever  taken  into  consideration.  The  balance  between 
you  and  your  employer  is  struck  once  a  week,  when  your 
draft  is  forwarded.      I  remember  how  this  was  impressed 


"FIRING"   A   CORRESPONDENT        311 

upon  me  by  the  way  in  which  the  London  correspondent 
of  an  American  paper — who  for  years  had  done  faithful 
service  to  his  employers — was  "  fired  "  one  day  from  the 
London  office.  He  had  missed  some  item  of  news,  and 
had  received  that  morning  a  sharp  rebuke  by  cable  from 
the  proprietor,  who  was  then  wintering  in  San  Francisco. 
He  cabled  back  :  "  Can't  be  expected  to  cover  Europe 
from  the  top  of  a  penny  'bus."  In  the  course  of  the 
afternoon  a  reply-cable  came  from  San  Francisco,  "You 
can  climb  down  off  that  penny  'bus."  That  same  evening 
another  correspondent,  who  had  probably  been  dining 
at  Lockhart's  that  day,  took  over  the  office,  and  my 
ex-chief  passed  from  an  income  of  £2^  a  week  to  no 
income  at  all,  to  be  reinstated  with  a  reduced  sense 
of  his  own  importance  after  some  months  of  the  moral 
tonic  course. 

As   opposed    to   the    penalties    to    be   expected    for 
negligence,  there    was    a    suggestion    that   exceptionally 
good  service  would  bring  with  it  special  rewards.     I  may 
say  that    I    never    received    any  such    encouragements. 
I     have    no    diamond    rings    to    display    as    tokens    of 
successful     "  beats."      Yet    I    had    imagined    that   when 
I  enabled  my  editor  to  be  alone  in   publishing  the  true 
result  of  the  General  Elections  in  France  in  1889,  when 
Boulanger  and  his  party  were   routed,  I    should  receive 
some    recognition.     "  Not    being  an  American,"   I   was 
told,  "  you  can  have  no  idea  what  little  importance  we 
attach  in  the  States  to  European  politics."     I  might  have 
answered  that  if  that  were  the  case  I  did  not  understand 
why  for  weeks  previously  I   had  been  bombarded  with 
letters  and  telegrams    from    the    London    office    urging 
on    me  the    importance   of  "  covering "   these    elections 
thoroughly.     Nor  did  the  beat  I  secured  over  the  Zola 
trial,  when  the  news  of  his  conviction  reached  my  paper 


312  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

one  hour  before  any  other  ioiirnal  received  it,  elicit  more 
from  the  London  acjeni  ot"  the  j)aprr  llian  a  complaint 
about  the  amount  which  had  been  spent  in  securing  that 
service. 

In  spite  of  these  drawbacks  there  can  be   no   doubt 
that    the    training    thus    acquireil   is  for    any    man    who 
desires  to    follow  the  profession    of  journalism  a    most 
viduable   one.      I    think   that  the   best   proof  that   I   can 
give  of  that   is  that  every  one  of  the  four  young  men 
who    came  to    me    as  assistants,  with    no   other   qualifi- 
cations than  that  of  being  able  to  write  shorthand,  were 
able  at  once  on  leaving  me  to  find  excellent  positions 
on  the  press.     One  of   them  was   quite   recently  filling 
the    "chair"    of    the    Paris    edition    of   the  New    York 
Herald;  another  holds  an    important    post   in   London, 
and  a  third,  having  struck  out  an  independent  line,  is  a 
well-known   Parisian  contributor  to    London  magazines. 
On   the   last    gentleman    the    teaching   was  not    thrown 
away,  that  in  dealing   with  American  editors  it  is  always 
a    good    thing    to    have  more  than  one  string  to  one's 
bow.      He    passed    from    my  house    to    the  Neiu    York 
Herald,  and   after  having  worked  there   for  two  years, 
obtained   permission  to  go  to   England  to  get    married. 
On    his   return   to   Paris   with  his   young  w^ife,   the  first 
news  that  greeted  him  on  reaching  the   office  was  that 
he  was  dismissed.      No  reason   for  this  step  was  given 
him,  and  but  for  the  fact  that  he  had  been  prepared  for 
the   possibility    of   an   act   so  arbitrary,   he   might  have 
found    himself   in    the    same    position  as  the  one    from 
which    I    once    rescued    another    American    journalist. 
This  man,  having  been  dismissed  at  a  week's  notice,  and 
having  no  resources  but  his  weekly  salary,  found  himself 
absolutely  destitute  in    Paris.      He  was  obliged  to  leave 
his  hotel  without  paying  his  bill  and  without  his  luggage, 


THE    USUAL   RETURN 


^'3 


and  but  that  I  was  able  to  afford  him  shelter  and 
hospitality  for  some  weeks,  it  is  difficult  to  say  what 
would  have  become  of  him.  I  will  not  complete  the 
story  by  relating  what  return  he  made  me.  It  will  be 
sufficient  perhaps  to  say  that  he  made  me  the  usual 
return. 

The  movements  of  millionaires  in  Paris  were  con- 
sidered by  the  Yellow  editors  news  items  of  paramount 
importance.  I  was  in  this  way  brought  into  contact 
with  many  of  the  richest  men  in  the  States.  I  invariably 
found  them  affable  and  obliging,  although  they  usually 
made  me  understand  that  they  were  at  a  loss  to  know 
why  the  public  should  be  particularly  interested  in  them. 
One  of  the  most  courteous  and  delightful  old  gentlemen 
whom  I  have  ever  met  I  encountered  in  this  way, 
John  Jacob  Astor.  The  people  at  the  Bristol  Hotel 
had  standing  orders  to  give  me  immediate  access  to  him 
whenever  I  called.  We  used  to  laugh  at  the  absurdity 
of  the  business  which  had  first  brought  us  together. 

Before  I  made  his  acquaintance  I  had  been  forced  by 
the  head  European  correspondent  of  the  paper  which 
I  was  then  representing  to  do  what  I  had  considered  a 
very  unpleasant  piece  of  work  in  connection  with  him. 
"  See  here,"  my  superior  had  said,  "  I'll  give  you  a 
good  idea  of  a  story  which  will  fetch  them  in  New  York. 
Old  John  Jacob's  at  the  Bristol.  He  can  afford  to 
spend  thousands  of  dollars  per  diem.  Now  just  you 
find  out  what  he  spends,  say  in  two  hours.  Hang 
about  the  Place  Vendome  until  he  comes  out — he  usually 
takes  a  toddle  towards  two  o'clock  ;  shadow  him  and 
make  a  note  of  every  cent  he  spends.  Then  we'll  figure 
out  what  he  has  saved  on  that  two  hours'  outlay." 
I  told  my  chief  that  I  considered  the  "  assignment  "  a 
most  idiotic  one,   and  a  nasty  piece  of  prying ;   but — 


:,i.\  TWI'XTV   Vr.ARS    1\    PARIS 

well.  I  was  forced  to  do  it.  llowcxcr,  I  rclicxcd  my 
conscience  hy  icIlinL;^  Mr.  Asior  all  about  it  when  I 
canu'  to  know  him.  He  was  much  amused.  "Well, 
and  what  <//</  I  spend  that  tlay  ?  "  he  asked  with  that 
smile  which  one  likes  to  remember.  "About  thirty 
cents  in  the  two  hours,"  I  said.  "  You  bought  a  bouquet 
of  violets  outside  the  hotel,  and  a  paper  at  the  shop 
in  the  Rue  de  Castiglione,  and  then  after  a  walk  in  the 
Tuileries  you  had  a  tuck-in  at  the  confectioner's  shop 
at  the  corner  of  the  Rue  de  Rivoli."  He  then  asked 
me  what  day  it  was,  and  when  I  told  him  he  said,  "  You 
were  fifty  per  cent,  wrong  in  your  calculations ;  for 
I  remember  that  that  afternoon,  when  I  went  into  that 
shop  in  the  Rue  Castiglione,  I  paid  thirty  cents  for  this 
book  of  yours,"  producing  a  copy  of  a  shilling  edition 
of  one  of  my  stories.  Then  he  turned  grave,  and, 
speaking  in  a  kind  and  paternal  manner,  he  said,  "  Look 
here,  don't  you  think  that  it's  a  pity  that  a  young  man 
like  you  should  be  wasting  your  time  in  doing  such 
silly  work  as  that?  Couldn't  you  find  something  better 
to  do  ? " 

An  "  assiofnment  "  of  a  somewhat  foolish  but 
amusing  nature  for  an  American  paper  with  which 
I  was  at  that  time  connected  as  Paris  correspondent 
procured  for  me  the  advantage  of  the  acquaintance  of 
Jules  Verne,  which  in  a  short  time  developed  into  much 
mutual  goodwill.  The  proprietors  of  the  journal  in 
question  had  sent  a  girl  reporter  on  a  journey  round  the 
world,  the  point  being  to  demonstrate  that  this  could 
be  effected  in  considerably  less  time  than  was  occupied 
by  Phineas  Fogg,  the  hero  of  Verne's  novel.  Round  the 
World  in  Eighty  Days. 

It  was  thought  that  it  would  give  a  good  advertise- 
ment to  the  "  story  "  if  on   her   way  through  France  to 


JULES    VERNE    AND   THE    GIRL       315 

Brindisi  the  girl  could  meet  Jules  Verne  in  Amiens. 
I  was  ordered  to  arrange  the  meeting.  At  first  the 
old  gentleman  did  not  at  all  understand  what  purpose 
could  be  served  by  such  a  meeting,  and  it  required  some 
persuasion  on  my  part  to  induce  him  to  consent.  The 
task  was  all  the  more  difficult  for  me  because  I  felt  that 
we  were  taking  advantage  for  our  own  purposes  of  his 
complacency.  The  meeting  came  off  most  successfully. 
The  girl  reached  Calais  in  time  to  come  to  Amiens,  see 
Verne,  and  return  to  Calais  to  take  the  Brindisi  express. 
I  had  manao^ed  so  to  interest  Verne  in  the'scheme  that  he 
was  good  enough  to  come  to  the  station  at  Amiens 
to  meet  the  American  reporter,  bringing  a  bouquet  with 
him  to  present  to  her. 

From  the  station  we  drove  to  his  house  on  the 
Boulevard  Longueville,  and  spent  about  half  an  hour 
there.  Verne  could  not  believe  that  the  slight  young 
woman  could  possibly  be  going  round  the  world  all  by 
herself.  "  Why,  she  looks  a  mere  child,"  he  said.  But 
he  warmed  into  interest  in  the  venture,  and  I  remember 
his  asking  me  to  tell  the  young  woman  that  he  con- 
sidered that  the  journey  would  effect  a  good  purpose. 
"It  comes  just  at  the  right  time,"  he  said,  "because 
fast  as  you  undoubtedly  will  travel,  it  will  call  attention 
to  the  comparative  want  of  communications  for  such 
a  voyage.  It  should  stir  up  the  Russian  Government  to 
begin  upon  that  trans-Siberian  railway.  When  that  is 
finished,  mademoiselle,  you  will  be  able  to  beat  the 
record,  which  I  am  convinced  you  are  about  to  make 
for  yourself,  and  to  get  round  the  world  in  forty-five 
days." 

The  voyage  was  accomplished  in  seventy-two  days, 
and  I  was  sent  down  to  Amiens  again  to  "  interview  " 
the    novelist   on    the   achievement.       I    dined  with   the 


3i6  TWI-XTV   VI-ARS    IN    PARIS 

V^ernes  that  (.'voniiiL^.  and  my  host  opened  a  dusty  bottle 
of  Pontol-Cancl  with  whiidi  to  drink  the  lieakh  of  tlie 
plucky  younc^  female  journalist,  lie  spoke  that  evcnint^ 
of  workint;  her  into  a  story  which  he  was  then  pro- 
jcctinij^.  antl  which  was  to  be  called  Lady  Franklin. 
I  do  not  remember  whether  he  ever  carried  out  his 
intention,  but  I  fancy  that  after  a  while  it  occurred  to 
him  that  he  had  only  been  broui^ht  into  the  affair  for 
the  sake  of  the  advertisement  which  his  name  would 
give  to  the  undertaking^. 

He  did  not  receive  one  word  of  thanks  from  the 
editor  of  the  paper  for  his  kindness  and  civility. 
I  repeatedly  asked  that  a  letter  of  thanks  might  be 
sent  to  him,  but  I  was  told  that  the  "  old  man  had 
got  good  advertising  out  of  it  and  had  no  reason  to 
complain."  For  the  part  I  had  played  in  the  matter 
he  bore  no  resentment  against  me,  though  I  know  he 
felt  that  he  had  not  been  treated  with  courtesy.  I  was 
with  him  only  a  few  weeks  before  his  death,  and  we 
were  talking  over  old  times,  and  he  said  that  it  was 
very  strange  that  after  he  had  served  the  purpose  of 
the  paper  not  a  word  of  acknowledgment  had  been 
made  to    him. 

It  was  certainly  an  absurd  suggestion  that  he  had 
acted  in  the  matter  from  any  spirit  of  self-interest,  for 
there  never  was  a  less  self-seeking  man.  I  shall  not 
forget  my  surprise  when,  one  day  in  Paris,  his  son, 
Michel  Verne,  speaking  to  me  about  his  father,  told 
me  that  never  in  his  life  had  he  earned  from  his  pen 
as  much  as  a  thousand  pounds  a  year.  I  asked  Jules 
Verne  about  this  afterwards,  when  I  was  with  him  in 
Amiens,  and  he  said  that  it  was  quite  true.  "  I  made 
an  arrangement  with  my  publishers  many  years  ago  to 
supply  them  with  two  novels   every  year   for  an  annual 


JULES   VERNE   AND    HIS    PUBLISHER  317 

payment,  which  is  certainly  less  than  the  sum  you 
mention.  Was  it  a  good  bargain  or  was  it  a  bad  one  ? 
I  do  not  know.  1  may  add  that  I  do  not  care.  If  my 
pubHshers  have  done  well  out  of  the  arrangement,  tant 

mieux.     Monsieur has  always  been  most  courteous 

and  kind  to  me,  and  I  wish  him  all  prosperity."  What 
concerned  him  far  more  was  his  literary  reputation.  He 
was  delighted  with  the  popularity  which  his  books  enjoyed 
abroad,  and  on  that  last  occasion  when  I  was  with  him 
he  once  more  showed  me  a  beautiful  walking-stick  which 
had  been  presented  to  him  by  the  subscriptions  of  a 
number  of  English  school-children.  "  This  walking- 
stick,"  he  said,  "is,  I  may  say,  to  parody  the  words  of 
Monsieur  Prud'homme,  le  plus  beau  jour  de  ma  vie." 
He  felt  greatly  hurt  at  the  indifference  of  French 
men  of  letters  to  his  work.  He  had  had  ambitions  at 
one  time  to  take  his  seat  in  the  French  Academy. 
"  Since  then,"  he  said  to  me,  "the  Academy  has  filled 
up  every  one  of  its  seats  afresh." 

The  last  hour  which  I  spent  in  his  company  was  a 
sad  one,  although  at  that  time  I  could  not  foresee  that 
it  was  to  be  the  last  time  that  I  should  be  with  him. 
He  was  haunted  with  the  fear  of  blindness.  Yet,  as 
he  told  me,  he  was  sticking  manfully  to  his  work,  and 
could  hope  to  carry  out  his  contract  with  his  publishers 
to  the  very  end.  He  told  me  that  he  had  then  com- 
pleted nine  or  ten  volumes,  and  could  supply  the  annual 
demand  for  two  volumes  from  his  pen  for  five  years  to 
come.  He  wrote  his  name  for  me  on  a  picture  post- 
card likeness  of  himself  before  we  parted.  Years 
before  he  had  written  for  me  a  preface  to  one  of  my 
books. 

My   work  for  the  London   papers  was,  if  much  less 
exciting   than    my   American  "  assignments,"   decidedly 


3iS  rWl-N  rV    Nl'ARS    IX    PARIS 

more  pleasant.  Mv  trainiiii^  lu-rc  stdod  nic  in  oooci 
siciul.  In  I  he  rail  Mall  untii-r  Stead  ami  afterwards 
under  Cusl,  in  the  IVcstfninsfcr  Gazette  under  Cook, 
and  in  the  Daily  GrapJiic  for  three  or  four  years  from 
its  commencement,  I  was  able  to  do  work  which 
attracted  attention.  I  abandoned  the  old,  easy  devices 
of  correspondents.  The  person  of  "  high  official 
authority  whose  name  must  not  be  mentioned  "  never 
figured  in  my  despatches,  and  I  do  not  think  that  I  once 
quoted  from  the  "  semi-official  "  this  or  that.  When 
I  had  the  "  highest  authority  "  for  saying  anything 
I  gave  it.  Another  innovation  which  I  was  able  to 
introduce  was  that  of  signing  my  name  to  my  articles, 
and  I  claim  this  from  my  brother  workers,  that  I  was 
the  first  to  break  down  the  unfair  system  of  anonymity 
which  used  to  be  imposed  on  English  writers  to  the 
press. 

I  remember,  apropos  of  this,  remonstrating  with  Zola 
when,  previous  to  his  visit  to  London,  he  told  me  that 
it  was  his  intention  to  speak  in  favour  of  such  anonymity. 
I  asked  him  whether  his  ddbiits  would  not  have  been 
greatly  delayed  if  the  same  constraint  had  been  put 
upon  him.  "  That  never  occurred  to  me,"  he  said. 
"  As  you  know,  I  am  only  going  to  England  with  the 
wish  to  please  everybody,  and  I  have  been  told  that 
the  general  feeling  over  there  is  that  newspaper  articles 
should  be  anonymous.  I  don't  want  to  set  the  news- 
papers against  me."  The  reform  is  now  general  in 
England,  mainly  thanks  to  the  fair-mindedness  of  Sir 
Alfred  Harmsworth,  but  the  initiation  of  it  was  not 
effected  without  sacrifices.  Much  remunerative  work 
was  refused  by  me  because  the  rule  of  anonymity  was 
imposed.  On  the  other  hand,  certain  of  my  confreres 
who  had  not  the  courage   to   follow  my  example,  seemed 


"CES   CHERS   CONFRERES"  319 

to  think  themselves  personally  injured  by  imy  conduct 
of  my  own  affairs,  and  retaliated  on  me  by  setting  afloat 
feeble  calumnies  concerning  me. 

In  Paris,  however,  amongst  literary  people  calumny 
is  so  common  that  it  fails  its  purpose.  Indeed,  the  man 
who  does  not  hear  with  a  certain  regularity  that  he  is 
being  charged  with  continual  infamy  of  conduct  may 
begin  to  feel  uneasy  as  to  his  position.  The  lesson 
which  was  taught  by  Alexandre  Dumas  on  a  famous 
occasion  to  his  valet-de-chambre  is  one  to  be  remembered. 
A  man  had  written  up  in  chalk  on  the  front  of  Dumas's 
house  some  very  offensive  remark  about  him,  and  the 
valet,  in  high  indignation,  after  effacing  the  libel,  was 
about  to  give  the  man  a  thrashing,  when  Dumas,  who 
had  been  looking  on,  cried  out,  "  Leave  him  alone. 
Every  little  helps." 

It  sometimes  amuses  me  still  to  go  into  a  certain 
caf^  on  the  boulevards,  where  the  minor  correspondents 
meet  with  French  liit^ratetirs,  and  to  listen  to  the 
abominable  inventions  which  are  passed  round  about 
the  men  who  "  have  arrived."  I  protest  that  I  find  the 
conversation  of  these  men,  whom  Felicien  Champsaur 
calls  the  "  loups,  renards,  chats-pards  de  lettres,"  more 
screamingly  funny  than  a  Palais-Royal  farce,  and  wonder 
greatly  that  fellows  so  contemptible  could  ever  have 
aroused  my  indignation. 

For  the  rest,  my  business  being  with  the  Parisians, 
I  avoided  the  society  of  my  confreres  and  formed  no 
acquaintances  amongst  the  correspondents  with  the 
exception  of  one  or  two  of  the  leading  men.  I  had  a 
slight  acquaintance  with  Theodore  Child,  with  Blowitz, 
and  Sir  Campbell  Clarke  ;  and  when  that  prince  amongst 
Paris  correspondents,  Richard  Whiteing,  was  in  Paris, 
1  occasionally  had  the  privilege  of  seeing  him.     But  of 


320  IWI-NTY    YFARS    IN    PARIS 

the  society  whicli  used  to  collect  in  the  bars  and  caj^s 
I  knew  nothing  except  what  echo  l)rouq;ht  to  my  ears. 
May  these  lew  words /;'t>  donio  be  excused  nie  ! 

During  all  those  years  of  active  journalism  I  did  not 
lose  sight  of  the  objects  which  I  first  had  in  view  in 
coming  to  Paris,  the  pursuit  of  literature  and  the  cultiva- 
tion of  the  friendship  of  nien  and  women  of  master 
minds.  It  in  the  last  object  my  success  far  exceeded  my 
most  sanguine  expectations,  it  was  I  had  never  hoped 
to  find  people  so  good  and  so  gracious  as  the  Parisians 
are  towards  those  who  take  the  trouble  to  find  the  way 
to  their  hearts. 

It  has  always  occurred  to  me  that  the  life  of  the 
Englishman  in  Paris,  who  has  no  other  resource  than  his 
salary  as  correspondent  to  an  English  newspaper,  is  one 
of  the  most  precarious  of  existences.  The  salaries 
allowed  are  never  more  than  sufficient  to  maintain  him, 
and  the  more  important  the  paper,  and  consequently  the 
higher  the  remuneration,  the  more  expenses  he  has  to 
incur  in  keeping  up  appearances.  He  has  no  fixity  of 
tenure. 

Quite  recently  we  have  witnessed  in  Paris  the  removal 
from  their  posts  of  correspondents  who  might  reasonably 
have  hoped  to  have  retained  their  employment  as  long 
as  their  power  of  work  lasted.  But  newspapers  are  but 
commercial  undertakings,  and  subject  to  the  fluctuations 
of  such.  As  to  my  own  appointments,  I  used  to  inspire 
myself  from  the  teachings  of  Mrs.  Gamp,  and  took  them 
cis  they  came  and  as  they  went.  One  day  a  cable  from 
New  York  would  reduce  my  income  by  four  or  five 
hundred  a  year  ;  another  day  would  bring  with  the 
morning's  post  an  ample  compensation  in  the  form  of  a 
better  appointment  on  some  other  journal.  As  saving 
money   out  of  such   incomes  as   are   received   by    Paris 


THE  PRECARIOUSNESS  OF  THE  PLACES  321 

correspondents  is  entirely  out  of  the  question,  I  cannot 
conceive  how  men  who  have  no  other  resources  than  this 
income  can  manage  to  survive  when  it  is  taken  from  them, 
either  by  the  whim  of  their  employers  or  by  the  hazards  of 
the  fortunes  of  the  paper  which  they  have  been  represent- 
ing. When  retrenchment  becomes  necessary  in  a  news- 
paper office  the  foreign  correspondence  is  the  first  service 
that  is  sacrificed.  It  is,  under  the  circumstances,  highly 
creditable  to  foreign  correspondents,  as  a  class,  that  one 
so  rarely  hears  of  any  effort  being  made  by  one  of  them 
to  supplement  his  income  or  to  provide  for  emergencies 
by  transactions  of  a  doubtful  nature.  In  a  few  notorious 
cases  which  have  occurred,  the  reprehension  expressed 
has  been  general,  and  the  offender  has  been  made  to  feel 
by  the  open  contempt  of  his  colleagues  with  what 
sentiments  his  conduct  has  inspired  them. 

As  compared  to  the  life  of  the  American  correspondent, 
that  of  the  English  journalist  in  Paris  is  monotonous 
indeed.  Inasmuch  as  little  news  about  Paris  and  the 
Parisians  is  required  from  the  Americans,  and  the  doings 
of  his  travelling  countrymen  are  of  primary  importance  as 
news  items,  he  is  bound  to  no  one  place  nor  to  any 
dismal  routine  of  duties.  He  travels  about  France  ;  he 
is  ever  on  the  look-out  for  something  new.  During  the 
years  when  I  acted  for  American  papers  in  Paris,  I 
visited  most  of  the  countries  in  Europe,  and  was  brought 
into  contact  with  all  classes  of  men  and  women.  For 
the  English  correspondent,  on  the  other  hand,  year  in 
year  out,  each  month,  almost  each  week,  brings  with  it 
the  same  subjects,  the  same  duties.  Now  that  I  am 
away  from  it  all,  with  what  relief  can  I  watch  the 
recurring  functions  of  Parisian  life,  without  having  to  vex 
my  head  to  vary  the  clichds  of  description  which  have  to 
be  served  up  again  and  again  !     What  new  things  could 

21 


322         T\vi-xr\'  \i:.\Rs  IX  taris 

I  tincl  to  say  of  Rcvt-illon,  of  New  Year's  l).iy  in  Paris, 
of  the  Concours  Hippique,  of  Sarah  Bernhardt's  revival 
of  La  Dame  aux  Caiucllias,  of  the  Quatorze  Juillet,  of  the 
Ri-ntrt'c — the  very  logop^ranis  of  Parisian  correspondence? 
And  the  salons  !  What  a  blessed  relief  no  longer  to  be 
obliged  to  survey  acres  of  dismal  canvases  and  to  have 
to  write  out  once  more  the  monotonous  commonplaces 
about  the  painters,  of  whom  alone,  because  of  their  estab- 
lished reputations,  one  is  allowed  to  speak! 

In  another  respect  also  the  position  of  the  American 
correspondent  is  a  better  one.  He  is  given  carte 
blanche  in  the  matter  of  expenses.  I  have  spent  as 
much  as  ^300  in  one  cable  to  New  York.  When 
I  was  travelling,  £2  a  day  were  allowed  me  for 
hotel  expenses  alone.  If  the  item  of  news  be  a  valuable 
one,  there  are  absolutely  no  limits  to  what  one  may  spend, 
first  in  securing  it,  and  next  in  insuring  its  promptest 
transmittal  to  the  head  office.  Such  havmg  been  my 
experience,  it  will  be  understood  with  what  amusement 
I  once  received  instructions  from  a  London  office  that, 
in  order  to  reduce  expenses,  I  was  in  future  to  write  up 
events  about  to  occur  in  a  variety  of  manners  in  advance, 
and  to  number  each  version  of  the  event  that  was  about 
to  happen  with  a  distinguishing  letter.  After  the  event, 
I  was  to  telegraph  merely  the  distinguishing  letter  of  the 
paragraph  which  most  closely  described  the  way  matters 
had  gone,  so  that  the  news  could  be  printed  from  the 
copy  already  in  hand.  I  was  forced  to  reply  that  both 
imagination  and  time  would  fail  me  for  such  prophetic 
labours. 

Independence  of  opinion  is  not  encouraged  in  the 
Paris  correspondent,  whether  he  be  working  for  England 
or  for  America.  Political  news,  for  instance,  which  does 
not  coincide  with  the  editorial  policy  of  the  paper,  is  not 


SUB-EDITORIAL    PARTISANSHIP       323 

welcomed.  Where  the  foreign  sub-editor  is  a  partisan, 
the  correspondent's  difficulties  will  be  very  great.  This 
partisanship  often  extends  to  questions  of  a  non-political 
nature.  The  sub-editor's  views  on  French  literature  and 
painting  and  drama  may  differ  from  those  of  the 
correspondent,  and  conflict  may  arise.  It  was  such  par- 
tisanship which  deprived  me  of  the  honour  of  being  the 
first  writer  in  England  to  announce  the  discovery  of  that 
great  poet,  Maurice  Maeterlinck.  I  had  been  in  com- 
pany of  Francois  Coppee,  in  a  village  near  Paris,  where 
we  both  had  vill(fgiatures,  and  Coppee  had  told  me  that 
he  had  received  from  Belgium  a  volume  of  poems  by 
a  young  author  which  revealed  genius,  Maeterlinck,  it 
appeared,  had  sent  a  copy  of  his  Serves  Chaudes  to  every 
member  of  the  French  Academy,  and  Coppee  had  been 
reading  the  one  which  he  had  received.  That  evening 
I  sent  the  announcement  to  London  that  literary  Paris 
was  preparing  to  hail  a  new  star.  The  paragraph  was 
not  inserted,  and  a  few  days  later  the  editor,  who  was 
passing  through  Paris,  informed  me  that  the  sub-editor 
had  reported  me  to  him  for  "  puffing  a  friend."  Some 
days  later,  Octave  Mirbeau  published  his  famous  article 
on  Maeterlinck,  and  the  poet's  reputation  was  established. 
This  by  no  means  put  the  sub-editor  in  question  out 
of  countenance,  and  for  a  long  time  afterwards  the 
"  Belgian  Shakespeare  "  was  referred  to  in  the  columns 
which  were  under  his  control  in  terms  of  derision. 
When  some  time  later  I  met  Maeterlinck  at  a  luncheon 
given  to  him  at  the  Cafe  Voltaire  by  the  young  poets 
of  Paris,  I  had  some  difficulty  in  assuring  him  that  I 
was  by  no  means  responsible  for  the  attacks  which  had 
been  made  against  him  in  the  paper  which  I  was  then 
representing. 


CHAPTER  XX 

Coquelin  Cadet — Au^ste  Maquet — The  "  Ghost "  of  Alexandre  Dumas — 
Why  Bonvin  Starved — Coquelin's  Mother— Behind  the  Scenes  at  the 
Com^die  Franqaise — Mademoiselle  Reichemberg — Jules  Claretie — 
Sardou — Sarah  Bernhardt  and  the  Cat — Jules  Lemaitre  and  George 
Ohnet — Massenet — The  Two  Mounets — Coquelin  the  Elder — Parisian 
Painters— Melba's  Debuts  in  Paris — Whistler. 

ONE  of  the  earliest  friendships  which  I  formed  in 
Paris  was  that  of  Coquelin  cadet.  It  was  a 
beautiful  trait  in  the  man's  character  that  first  attracted 
me  to  him.  It  was  revealed  to  me  by  something  that 
I  saw  in  his  house. 

That  day,  I  remember,  I  had  been  attending  the 
funeral  of  Auguste  Maquet.  I  can  hear  my  reader 
saying:  "Who's  that?  What  Auguste  Maquet?" 
Alas  !  that  was  the  question  that  used  to  be  asked  in 
his  lifetime.  Auguste  Maquet  was  one  of  the  many 
"  ghosts  "  of  Alexandre  Dumas.  It  was  said  of  him 
that  he  did  the  lion's  share  of  Dumas'  work.  It  is  not, 
I  think,  denied  that  the  Vicomte  de  Bragelonne  was 
entirely  from  his  pen.  At  the  time  of  his  death  it 
was  stated  that  the  Trois  Mousquetaires  also  had  been 
written  almost  alone  by  him.  As  we  were  walking 
behind  his  hearse  I  heard  him  spoken  of  as  its  sole 
author.  W^hether  that  be  true  I  have  never  been  able 
to  find  out.  Honore  Champion,  the  publisher,  who  was 
a   friend   of  Dumas,   told   me    that   it   had    never   been 

324 


Photo  by  Belli,,    ,>\(.  / 


M.    COQUELIN,   CADET. 


ALEXANDRE    DUMAS'   GHOST  325 

contested  that  many  of  the  works  signed  by  him  were 
written  by  other  men.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  Dumas  never 
denied  the  collaboration  of  Maquet.  It  is  recorded  of 
him  that  he  once  suggested  to  Emile  de  Girardin  that 
Maquet's  name  should  appear  alongside  of  his  as  joint 
author  of  a  feuilleton  which  he  was  contributing  to 
La  Presse.  The  editor  refused.  ''  A  feuilleton  signed 
'Alexandre  Dumas,'"  he  said,  "is  worth  three  francs 
a  line.  A  feziilleton  signed  *  Dumas  et  Maquet '  is  worth 
only  half  that  amount." 

The  indebtedness  of  the  famous  author  to  the  obscure 
writer  was  notorious.  It  is  related  that  one  day  Aurelien 
Scholl  then  quite  a  youth,  was  dining  at  Dumas'  table. 
Dumas,  who  always  prided  himself  on  his  cooking, 
announced  a  marvellous  sauce,  and  having  helped  Scholl 
to  some,  asked  with  the  expectant  vanity  of  the  artist, 
"  Well,  what  do  you  think  of  my  sauce  ?  "  "  Est-ce 
du  Maquet?"  ("Did  Maquet  make  it?")  asked  Scholl 
innocently. 

Dumas,  indeed,  was  most  anxious  that  Maquet  should 
enjoy  some  share  of  the  credit.  I  think  that  this  shows  the 
important  part  which  Maquet  had  taken  in  Dumas'  pro- 
duction. "Is  your  mother  in  the  theatre?"  he  said  to  his 
collaborator  when  on  the  evening  of  Oct.  27,  1847,  ^^e 
curtain  had  fallen  on  the  last  act  of  the  dramatic  adapta- 
tion o^  Les  Trois  Mousqiietaires,  and  while  the  applaud- 
ing audience  was  waiting  to  hear  the  name  of  the  author 
announced.  "  Yes,"  answered  Maquet,  "she  is,"  "  Well, 
then,"  said  Dumas,  "  watch  her  face."  He  then  stepped 
before  the  curtain  and  announced  Maquet's  name  as  that 
of  his  collaborator.  Ludovic  Halevy  told  us  this  story 
over  Maquet's  grave.  The  poor  man  had  long  outlived 
such  reputation  as  had  been  charily  doled  out  to  him, 
and  he  died  in  obscurity  and   poverty.      Yet   a  great 


326  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

concourse  ofiiterary  .uul  artistic  Paris  followed  his  hearse 
to  the  grave. 

It  was  on   returning  from   the  cemetery  that  I  called 
on  Coquelin  cadet.      He  then  lived  in  a  fine  apartment 
on  the  Boulevard  Haussmann,  just  behind  the  Opera.      I 
was  anxious  to  examine  in  detail  the  treasures  of  his  art 
collection.     I  was  particularly  desirous  of  seeing  a  picture 
by  Bonvin  about  which  there  was  a  story.      Bonvin,  who 
was  considered  to  have  many  points  of  resemblance  with 
our  Turner,  died  in  December,  1887,  of  starvation.      He 
had  been  brought  to  this  extremity  by  the  fact  that  he 
would  only  sell  his  pictures  to  people  whom  he  liked,  and 
the  other  fact  that  he  set  the  most  modest  valuation  on  the 
works  of  his  brush.    An  American  once  visited  his  studio, 
and  seeing  a  picture  which  he  admired  and  which  was 
nearly  completed,  asked  Bonvin  his  price  for  it.    "  Three 
thousand  francs,"   said  Bonvin.     This  was   less  than  a 
third  of  the  sum  which  the  American  had  expected  to 
be  asked,  and  the  bargain  was  at  once  concluded.     The 
American  was  to  pay  the  amount  on  delivery  of  the  picture 
in  a  few  days.     The  picture,  however,  never  came.     A 
few  months  later,  when  the  painter  was  asked  why  he 
had  not  kept  his  agreement,  he  answered  :   "  The  picture 
was  only    worth  half  the  sum   I   asked    for  it.       I   sold 
it    for    the    lesser   amount    to  an  actor  of  the  Comedie 
Fran9aise.     I   preferred  selling  to  a  Frenchman." 

Eccentricities  of  this  kind  had  reduced  him  to 
absolute  destitution.  A  few  years  before  his  death  an 
exhibition  of  his  works  had  been  organised,  and  subse- 
quently there  had  been  held  a  sale  on  his  behalf  The 
Baroness  Nathan  de  Rothschild  had  helped  him  with 
money.  Since  that  time  he  had  been  living  a  secluded 
and  miserable  life  at  St.  Germain-en-Laye,  deprived 
and  depriving  himself  of  all  but  the  bare  necessaries  of 


BONVIN'S   WORKS  327 

existence.  His  best  known  works  are  his  "  Reading  the 
Bible,"  "The  Shoemaker's  Apprentice,"  and  the  "Treport 
Blacksmiths."  His  reputation  as  the  French  Turner 
had  been  founded  on  other  works,  known  only  to  the 
connoisseurs. 

Poor   Bonvin's  picture    hung    in   Coquelin  s  billiard- 
room.     "  Ce  pauvre  Bonvin,"  he  said,  as  he  showed  it 
to  me.     That  was   indeed  all    that  was   to  be  said.     I 
saw  his  Whistlers,  his  Sargents,  and  his  Degas'.      But 
what   interested    me    most   was  a   number   of  exquisite 
paintings  by  Cazin.     The  admiration  which  I  expressed 
was  such  that  some  days  later  Coquelin  took  me  to  the 
house  of  a  banker  in  the  Rue  de  Clichy,  who  owned  the 
most   complete  collection  of  Cazins  in    Paris.      He  also 
showed  me  his  beautiful  bust  by   Falguieres  and  a  fine 
head  of  Victor  Hugo,  "  the  master  himself."     After  he 
had  shown  me  all  his  treasures — and  this  is  what  I  refer 
to  above — he  took  me  into  another  room  and  introduced 
me  to  his  mother.     I  then  recognised  the  little  old  woman 
who  had  let  me  in,  and  whom  from  her  dress  I  had  taken 
to  be  a  peasant  woman.     We  found  her  sitting  in  the 
dining-room,  which,  though  it  was  luxuriously  furnished, 
had  about  it  the  air  of  a  kitchen   in   some  prospering 
Norman  farmhouse,  with  its  grandfather's  clock  and  the 
high  iron  fender.     It  was  touching  to  see  the  simplicity 
of  the  old  lady  amidst  her   grand   surroundings.     She 
wore  a  large  pair  of  horn  spectacles,  such  as  Whistler 
and,    after   him,    J.    Joseph-Renaud    have     since    made 
fashionable  in  Paris,  and  was  knitting  stockings.     She 
stood  up  as  we  entered,  and  seemed  abashed.     It  was 
admirable  to  see  the  devotion  of  one  of  the  most  popular 
men  in  society  to  his  old    mother,   and  the    pride    with 
which  he  presented  me  to  his  mere  chdrie. — Her  talk 
was  as  simple  and  unaffected  as  her  dress  was  plain.    She 


328  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

was  a  homely  couniry-wonian  from  Boulogne,  from  where 
the  Coquelins  came. 

When  the  actor  saw  how  charmed  I  was  with  this 
corner  o\'  his  home-life,  this  glimi)se  behind  the  scenes, 
he  said.  '*  You  must  see  mother's  room."  I  followed  him 
from  thi-  luxury  o(  the  Parisian  dining-room  into  what 
resembled  the  simple  bedroom  in  a  country  cottage.  The 
walls  were  papered  with  a  common  paper,  and  were 
covered  with  portraits  of  her  sons  and  tokens  of  their 
triumphs — from  the  gilt  wreath  of  paper  leaves  which  this 
one  had  won  at  school  as  a  boy  to  the  laurel  triumphs  of  the 
world-acclaimed  actor  on  a  metropolitan  stage.  By  the 
bedside  in  a  cheap  pasteboard  frame  was  the  portrait  of 
her  daughter,  long  since  dead.  Next  to  this  was  one  of 
her  husband,  the  baker  of  Boulogne.  On  the  mantelpiece 
under  a  big  glass  globe  reposed  upon  a  bright-coloured 
cushion  the  orange-blossom  wreath  which  she  had  worn 
as  a  bride.  A  plain,  old-fashioned  silver  watch  lay  on 
the  table  by  the  bedside.  Here  and  there  were  other 
little  treasures  of  bygone  days,  remembrances  of  her 
cottage  life  in  Boulogne,  before  her  sons  had  risen  to 
fame  and  had  conquered  Paris.  "  My  mother  has  worked 
hard  for  sixty  years,"  said  the  actor,  who  had  now 
altogether  thrown  aside  the  mask  of  mundane  cynicism. 
The  old  lady  said  to  me,  "  My  sons  are  very  good  to 
me,  monsieur." 

It  was  the  custom  of  the  Coquelins  every  year  on 
their  mother's  /e/e  to  give  a  dinner  in  her  honour  at  the 
Cafe  Anglais,  to  which  the  ^/tle  of  Paris  were  invited. 
No  queen  was  more  royally  entertained  by  hearts  more 
loyal. 

After  that  day  I  saw  much  of  Coquelin  cadet,  and 
often  used  to  spend  the  evenings  in  his  dressing-room  at 
the  Fran9ais,  watching  him  making  up  for  his  parts  and 


IN    THE    HOUSE    OF   MOLIERE         329 

listening  to  the  story  of  his  Hfe,  his  struggles,  his  success. 
He  often  used  to  talk  to  me  about  Gambetta,  who 
was  a  great  friend  of  his  and  who  used  to  call  him 
Coquelin  printevips.  When  he  was  on  the  stage  and 
away  from  me  I  used  to  go  down  and  see  the  play  from 
behind  the  scenes.  I  felt  it  to  be  a  high  honour  and  a 
great  privilege  to  be  a  guest  in  the  very  house  of  Moliere. 
There  are  few  men  for  whose  memory  I  have  a  deeper 
reverence.  He  had  all  the  qualities  which  are  the  attri- 
butes of  great  men.  With  rare  genius  he  combined  a 
perfect  goodness  of  heart.  He  honoured  by  his  friend- 
ship the  sterile  pompousness  of  Louis  the  King.  I  know 
of  no  death  recorded  in  history  which  revealed  a  greater 
heroism  than  his.  I  wandered  through  his  house  with 
bated  breath  and  on  tip-toe  almost,  as  one  who  treads  the 
aisles  of  a  cathedral  where  the  greatest  men  lie  buried. 

Sometimes  I  would  venture  into  the  green-room  and 
exchange  a  few  words  with  Mademoiselle  Reichemberg, 
who  liked  to  talk  about  General  Boulanger.  I  remember 
that  one  day  she  asked  me  with  great  indignation  to  deny 
the  story  that  she  was  making  the  General  a  tool  for  her 
former  friends  in  the  monarchical  party.  "  My  friendship 
with  the  Due  d'Aumale,"  she  said,  "has  nothing  to  do 
with  my  present  friendship  for  General  Boulanger.  I 
naturally  keep  up  my  former  relationships,  but  they  have 
nothing  to  do  with  my  intimacy  with  the  General,  who 
has  been  a  friend  of  mine,  and  nothing  more,  ever  since 
I  was  a  little  girl." 

I  sometimes  met  Jules  Claretie,  the  director  of  the 
theatre,  behind  the  scenes,  and  I  remember  once  asking 
him — it  was  at  the  time  of  Donnelly's  visit  to  Paris — 
what  was  his  opinion  about  the  Bacon-Shakespeare  con- 
troversy. Monsieur  Claretie  never  espouses  any  side  in 
a  controversy — at  least  with  the  authority  of  his  name — 


2,7,0  TWI'.XI^V    VI«.\RS    IN    TARIS 

and  his  answer  was  a  i\  pical  cine.  He  said  :  "  I  have  read 
numerous  jxunphlets  on  the  subject,  and  they  have  taught 
nie  nothing.  It  suffu-es  me  to  admire  Ifixmlety  Macbeth, 
and  Kiiii^  Lear,  and  1  ^o  not  seek  to  know  if  God  exists  ; 
the  sun  sliines,  and  that  is  enough." 

On  another  occasion — I  fancy  it  must  have  been  at 
the  revival  of  Patrie — I  met  Sardou  in  the  green-room, 
and  we  talked  about  the  accusations  of  plagiarism  which 
had  been  brought  against  him  by  Maurice  Barrymore  of 
New  York,  whose  death  from  general  paralysis  was  re- 
corded a  few  months  ago.  Sardou  was  very  angry,  and 
had  evidently  been  stung  by  the  accusation,  "I  do  not 
know  a  single  word  of  his  piece,"  he  said.  "  I  have  quite 
enough  to  do  with  the  Barrymores  of  the  Old  World 
without  having,  in  addition,  to  trouble  myself  about  those 
of  the  New." 

A  constant  subject  of  conversation  in  the  green- 
room was  the  question  whether  Sarah  Bernhardt  would 
ever  be  induced  to  return  to  the  Comedie  Francaise. 
I  remember  Coquelin  aind  once  saying  to  me  on  this 
subject,  when  I  had  told  him  that  Madame  Bernhardt 
had  said  to  me  a  day  or  two  previously  that  under  certain 
circumstances  she  would  like  to  return,  "  What  in  the 
world  do  you  think  Sarah  could  do  with  the  income  they 
would  allow  her?"  I  said,  "  She  told  me  that  they  had 
offered  her  forty-five  thousand  francs  a  year,  which  was  not 
enough  to  subsist  upon."  Coquelin  exclaimed,  "  Forty- 
five  thousand  francs!  It  is  incredible  generosity.  I  should 
have  thought  they  would  have  offered  twenty  thousand 
francs.  And  why  in  the  world  should  she  play  for  forty- 
five  thousand  francs  a  year  when  she  can  make  half  as 
much  again  in  one  month  ?  This  month,  for  instance, 
she  will  make  over  sixty  thousand  francs." 

There  are  reasons  which   I   need  not  enter  upon  here 


SARAH    BERNHARDT   AND   THE    CAT     331 

why  I  prefer  to  pass  over  in  silence  my  memories  of  the 
great  and  wonderful  Sarah  Bernhardt.  But  just  as  I  was 
glad  to  relate  about  Coquelin  cadet  what  I  considered  a 
beautiful  trait  in  his  character,  so  also  I  wish  to  show 
that  Sarah  Bernhardt,  who  is  often  charged  with  being 
worldly  to  the  point  of  heartlessness,  has  the  humanest 
of  hearts.  I  don't  think  that  there  is  ever  anything  very 
wrong  about  a  man  or  woman  who  is  kind  to  animals. 
In  the  autumn  of  1889  a  horrible  story  went  the  round  of 
the  American  papers.*     This  so  excited  the  indignation 

*  THE  ORIGINAL  CAT  STORY. 

[Extefisively  printed  in    Western  Papers^ 

A  Western  society  woman  who  has  just  returned  from  Europe  tells 
a  shocking  story  of  Sarah  Bernhardt's  cruelty  to  a  pet  cat  which  has 
created  no  little  indignation  in  the  tender  hearts  of  those  who  have  heard 
the  story.  The  lady  was  a  great  admirer  of  the  actress,  and  while  in 
Paris  last  spring  took  occasion  to  call  on  her.  Madame  Bernhardt  some- 
times amuses  herself  painting  and  modelling.  She  received  the  lady 
very  kindly,  and  invited  her  earnestly  to  call  again.  After  a  lapse  of 
a  few  weeks  another  visit  was  made  to  the  actress.  She  was  found  very 
much  absorbed  in  the  half-finished  figure  of  her  little  model,  which  she 
had  been  working  at. 

At  the  request  of  the  lady,  who  was  anxious  to  see  her  at  work,  she 
continued  working.  After  awhile  a  frisky  little  cat,  the  pet  of  Sarah, 
rushed  into  the  room,  purring  and  scratching  with  delight.  The  cat 
sprang  upon  the  lap  of  the  actress,  but  she  was  so  much  interested  in 
her  work  that  the  animal  did  not  receive  the  expected  caressing. 

After  the  cat  had  interrupted  her  work  by  repeating  this  evidence 
of  affection  several  times,  she  became  very  much  irritated,  and  expressed 
herself  with  energy  in  highly  seasonable  language. 

But  the  little  pet,  not  understanding,  kept  on  its  gambols  until 
Bernhardt,  evidently  exasperated,  rose  with  a  shriek,  and  with  a  demoni- 
acal expression  on  her  face  lifted  the  poor  little  animal  by  the  loose 
skin  at  the  back  of  the  neck,  and,  raising  the  top  of  a  Chouberski  stove 
which  stood  in  the  room,  thrust  the  struggling  pet  in  on  the  hot  coals  ; 
then,  shutting  the  cover  down,  she  calmly  resumed  her  work  as  if  utterly 
unconscious  of  the  heartrending  cries  of  her  pet,  which  grew  fainter  and 
fainter  as  it  slowly  roasted  to  death. 


:,},2  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

of  the  Americans  that  it  was  seriously  proposed  that  the 
great  French  actress  should  be  boycotted  during  the 
tour  she  w.is  then  about  to  make  in  the  States.  The 
papers  took  the  story  up  and  fanned  public  execration  of 
the  alleged  deed  into  fever  heat.  The  matter  looked 
very  serious  for  the  success  of  Sarah's  tour,  at  a  time 
when  a  failure  in  America  would  have  meant  disaster  to 
her  aflairs.  I  accordingly  hurried  off  to  her  to  represent 
to  her  the  gravity  of  the  situation,  and  to  place  my 
services  at  her  disposal  for  giving  to  the  malicious  story 
a  widespread  denial.  The  following  is  a  report  of  our 
conversation,  which,  published  all  over  the  American 
Continent,  nailed  that  lie  to  the  counter.  I  reprint  it 
with  the  amusing  headlines  under  which  it  originally 
appeared : 

SARAH  BERNHARDT'S  CAT. 


THE     ECCENTRIC     ACTRESS     DENIES     THAT 
ROAST     FELINE     STORY. 


A     VERY      INTERESTING      INTERVIEW. 


The    Famous    French    Actress    Very    Much 

Annoyed    by    the    Tales    of    Her    Cruelty 

that    Have    Been     Published     Here— 

What  Sarah's  One   Hundred  and 

Twelve    Birds    ThinK    of    the 

Story— She  Never  Abused 

A    Pet    in    Her    Life. 


SARAH'S     INDIGNANT     DENIAL. 
(special  correspondence  of  the  world.) 

Paris,  Ocf.  3. — I  called  on  Sarah  Bernhardt  this  evening,  and  found 
her  in  her  dressing-room  in  the  Porte  St.  Martin  Theatre,  in  company 
of  the  j'eune  premier  of  the  Tosca  troupe,  whose  temples  were  still  running 
with  the  gore  of  Scarpia's  torments.  Sarah,  for  a  widow  of  so  recent 
creation,  was  looking  remarkably  lively  and  younger  than  ever. 

I  said :  "  It's  about  this  cat  story.' 


THE   "ROAST    FELINE    STORY"       333 

She  said :  "  It's  the  most  ridiculous  nonsense  that  was  ever 
invented." 

"  Is  there  no  truth  in  it  whatever  ?  Perhaps  you  singed  a  rug  or 
something  ;  a  catskin,  one  of  those  things  you  use  in  France  against 
rheumatism  or  something  of  the  sort  ?  " 

"  Faugh  !  Just  think  of  the  horrible  smell  that  would  have  made. 
No,  there  is  no  truth  in  it  at  all.  I  can't  imagine  who  gets  up  these 
stories  against  me.  This  is  not  the  first  time  I  have  been  accused  of 
ill-treating  animals.  About  four  years  ago  there  was  put  into  circulation 
a  story  that  I  had  baked  a  favourite  spaniel  of  mine  (the  dearest  little 
dog  you  ever  saw)  in  the  oven." 

*'  Who  are  these  ladies  who  accuse  you  ?  " 

"Oh,  I  think  they  must  be  (what  do  you  call  them?)  hallelujah 
lasses,  isn't  it  ? — people  belonging  to  the  Salvation  Army." 

"  There  is  a  story  that  you  have  instructed  solicitors  to  prosecute  the 
inventors  of  this  accusation  ?  " 

"  Oh,  no  !  I  hear  the  story  has  been  withdrawn.  All  I  have  done 
was  to  write  to  London  to  give  it  my  most  emphatic  denial." 

"  I  suppose  you  look  at  it  all  as  a  very  good  joke  ? " 

"  Oh,  not  at  all !  I  think  it  a  very  serious  matter,  and  am  most  upset 
about  it.  I  know  that  for  Mrs.  Took,  the  Presidentess  of  the  Humane 
Society,  to  have  taken  it  up  there  must  have  been  a  strong  feeling  on 
the  subject.  The  resolution  passed  by  the  Missouri  ladies,  inviting  the 
women  of  America  to  receive  me  with  coldness  on  my  next  visit  to  the 
States,  would  be,  if  it  were  generally  adopted,  the  most  disastrous  thing 
that  could  happen  to  me,  both  socially  and  as  an  artist. 

"In  America  the  women  are  the  absolute  mistresses  of  everything. 
{^Les  femmes  en  Am'eriqiie  menent  tout.)  The  m^ji  does  not  exist  in 
matters  of  this  sort.  You  have  no  idea,"  she  continued,  turning  to  a 
lady  sitting  in  her  dressing-room,  "  of  the  importance  of  the  role  played 
in  America  by  the  women.  It  is  as  if  the  men,  having  no  time  to  attend 
to  matters  of  sentiment,  relegate  them  into  the  hands  of  their  wives  and 
sisters.  But  I  cannot  think  that  this  resolution  will  have  any  effect, 
because  it  is  not  only  completely  unjust,  but  is  so  obviously  absurd. 
I  can  quite  understand  that  if  the  Americans  believe  me  to  be  guilty 
of  this  wickedness,  this  piece  of  cold-blooded  cruelty,  they  should  be 
disgusted,  because  there  is  perhaps  no  country  in  the  world  where 
animals  are  better  treated  than  in  the  States.  You  should  see  how  fat 
the  horses  are  out  there.  I  have  often  thought  as  I  have  been  travelling 
through  America  and  have  seen  their  splendid  cattle,  of  the  poor 
miserable  horses  of  Paris,  which  you  know  the  Parisians  themselves  call 


334  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

•  The  Woman's  Paradise,  the  Horse's  Hell.'  So  I  am  most  anxious  to 
have  that  story  denied.  I  assure  you  again  and  again  that  there  is  not  a 
word  of  truth  in  it." 

'•  You  have  the  reputation  of  being  very  fond  of  animals  ?  " 

"  Fond  ?  But  I  adore  them.  Yes,  that  is  not  exaggeration.  I 
adore  them.  I  have  loved  them  all  my  life.  A  pet  animal  is  such  a 
good  friend  to  have.  It  is  faithful ;  it  is  fond  of  you  ;  it  wants  nothing 
from  you  but  a  little  kindness,  and  it  does  not  worry  you  as  men  do  with 
interminable  compliments  and  idiocies.  Why,  I  look  forward  to  the 
time  when  I  shall  be  too  old  to  play,  and  shall  have  ever  so  many 
animals  about  me.  I  think  that  will  be  the  happiest  time  of  my  life. 
Did  you  never  hear  how  angry  I  was  with  Pasteur  and  the  quarrel  we 
had  ?  I  called  him  an  old  barbarian.  I  never  can  be  without  animals. 
I  don't  think  I  could  live  without  them.  People  thought  that  I  kept 
those  tiger-cats  to  get  myself  talked  about.  At  least  that  is  what  the 
papers  said. 

"  It  was  nothing  of  the  sort.  It  is  because  I  have  a  real  affection  for 
them,  and  more  than  an  affection — a  most  sincere  admiration.  The 
tiger-cat  is  the  most  graceful  thing.  We  women  who  think  ourselves  the 
most  graceful  things  on  God's  earth,  we  can't  compare  with  it.  Then 
there  is  my  leopard,  the  dearest  of  friends.  Do  you  know  that  I  feel 
that  they  understand  every  word  I  say  to  them  ?  I  have  thought  this 
all  my  life,  that  animals  understand  all  we  say  to  them,  but  despise  us 
and  all  our  base  intrigues  too  much  to  trouble  to  answer  us ;  that  is,  to 
trouble  to  learn  our  language  to  answer  us  with. 

"  I  dare  say  that  that  is  all  nonsense,  but  it  is  my  impression. 
I  know  that  often  when  my  nerves  are  unstrung  and  it  would  drive  me 
mad  to  have  to  talk  to  Peter  or  Paul  (you  know  you  have  seen  me  in 
that  state)  I  have  the  greatest  pleasure  in  going  and  talking  for  hours 
together  to  my  cats  or  to  my  dogs  or  to  my  birds.  I  often  tell  them 
things  that  I  would  never  tell  to  any  human  being,  and  I  am  sure  they 
sympathise  with  me. 

"Thus  when  I  heard  about  this  story  of  my  ill-treating  that  cat,  I 
had  all  my  animals  brought  into  my  studio,  where  my  big  bird-cage  is, 
and  I  told  them  what  was  being  said  about  me  over  there,  and  I  am 
sure  that  they  all  nearly  died  of  laughing.  The  birds  were  terribly 
noisy  all  that  evening,  doubtless  passing  counter  resolutions.  Ask 
Madame  Guerard,  my  housekeeper,  if  I  am  a  woman  who  would  torture 
an  animal.  She  will  tell  you  that  before  I  eat  I  see  that  the  pets  have 
been  cared  for,  that  I  often  feed  them  myself  when  I  am  not  too  tired 
out  with  work  and  worry,  but  that  always  they  are  my  first  care." 


SARAH    BERNHARDT'S    PETS  335 

"  You  still  have  as  many  birds  as  you  used  to  have  ?  " 
"  More  than  ever.  I  have  now  one  hundred  and  twelve  pet  birds, 
and  I  know  and  love  every  one  of  them.  Yes,  one  hundred  and  twelve 
birds  ;  and  so  if  my  reputation  of  baking  my  pets  in  ovens  be  true  you 
need  never  be  frightened  of  my  dying  of  hunger.  I  have  there  the 
wherewithal  to  feed  myself  for  a  long  time.  One  bird  a  day.  Why, 
they  would  last  me  nearly  half  a  year.  And  as  they  are  of  many 
different  kinds,  I  could  vary  my  menu  pretty  often.  But,  to  be  serious, 
please  tell  the  women  of  America  that  a  cruel  injustice  has  been  done 
me  and  that  it  has  pained  me  much.  I  think  I  know  them  well  enough 
to  say  that  they  will  not  let  me  suffer  long." 

Cadet's  dressing-room  was  an  informal  salon  in  which 
the  actor  used  to  hold  receptions  for  his  intimates. 
I  made  a  number  of  acquaintances  there.  One  of  these 
was  Jules  Lemaitre,  who  in  those  days  had  not  revealed 
the  fact  that,  although  a  rigorous  critic  of  the  dramatic 
works  of  others,  he  was  able  himself  to  write  plays  of  the 
very  highest  merit.  I  enjoyed  many  a  talk  with  this 
Academician,  and  he  used  to  send  me  copies  of  his  books 
with  friendly  inscriptions.  One  day,  however,  he  seemed 
cold  in  his  manner.  I  learned  the  reason  why  when  I 
reached  home  and  found  lying  on  my  table  the  post  from 
New  York.  At  that  time  I  was  writing  literary  articles 
on  French  books  for  the  New  York  Times.  Some  time 
previously  I  had  forwarded  a  long  review  of  a  very  poor 
novel  by  George  Ohnet,  entitled  Volontd,  and  in  a  sub- 
sequent letter  a  short  notice  of  Jules  Lemaitre's  new 
volume  of  l7npressio7is  de  Thddtre.  By  an  unfortunate 
coincidence  the  two  reviews  had  been  thrown  together 
so  as  to  form  one  article,  and  the  heading  given  to  that 
article  by  the  editor  was  "Books  by  Ohnet  and  Lemaitre." 

Knowing  what  was  the  opinion  held  by  the 
Academician  on  the  books  of  the  author  of  Le 
Maitre  des  Forges,  as  demonstrated  by  the  scathing 
and     never-forgotten    criticism    of     that    novel    which 


336  rWI  \  IV    Vr.ARS    IN    PARIS 

he   wroU',    I    could    understand    that    hc^    hail    not    been 
plcasetl  to    be    put    by     me    (as    he    thought)    in    such 
company.      I    hoped    that    Ohnet    might    not    have    felt 
the    same  annoyance,  for   I    knew   how   sensitive   he   is. 
1    remember   his  once   telling   me    in    his    house    in    the 
Avenue  Trudaine  that  he  did  not  think  "that  such  an 
unceasing  flood  of  abuse  had  ever  been  let  loose  against 
any  man  of  letters  as  against  him."     "  Everything,"  he 
said.  "  that  is  most  vile  and  most  cruel  has  been  said  and 
written  about  me.     And  yet  I  have  never  done  anything 
bad  that  I  know  of.      I  don't  steal  the  silver  spoons  when 
I  go  out  to  dinner-parties,  and  there  is  nothing  particularly 
disreputable  either  in  my  own  past    or    in    that    of   my 
family."     I  told  him  that  I  fancied  the  Parisian  journalists 
could  not  forgive  him  the  fact  that  he  had  engaged  in 
literature  when  he  had  a  private  income  of  eighty  thousand 
francs  a  year,  and  had  made  such  large  sums  of  money  by 
his  pen.      I  reminded  him  of  what  was  said  about  Lord 
Byron    by    less  successful  authors,  who  wondered  what 
right  a  lord  had  to  seek  for  literary  fame  and  emolument. 
Apropos  of  stealing  spoons  at  table,  I   am  reminded 
of  a  delightful  dt^jetmer  I  had  with  Monsieur   Massenet, 
the  composer,  at  his  house  in  the  Rue   General   Foy,  in 

the  course  of   which  he  told  me  that  ,   whom    he 

used  to  meet  in  Rome,  at  the  time  when  as  a  Prix  de 
Rome  he  was  studying  there,  was  a  confirmed  klepto- 
maniac, and  that  it  used  to  afford  him  great  diversion 
to  watch  the  maestro's  efforts  to  pocket  even  the  most 
cumbrous  pieces  of  plate.  "He  was  wonderfully 
dexterous,"  he  said,  "and  one  day,  to  the  astonishment 
of  us  all  who  were  watching  him  on  the  sly,  he  suc- 
ceeded in  getting  a  silver  soup-ladle  up  his  sleeve." 
Massenet  also  told  me  about  Liszt's  curious  use  of 
tobacco.     "He  could   not   play   unless  he    had    a  cigar 


LISZT   AND   HIS   CIGARS  33 

in  his  mouth.     But  he  did  not  light  it   nor  smoke  it 
he   used   to  eat  it.     He  would  sit  down  to  the  piano 
with  a  cigar  in  his  mouth,  and  keep  munching  at  it  while 
he  played.     When  the  cigar  was  quite  eaten  up,  he  used 
to  rise  from  the   instrument." 

The  dejeuner  which  Massenet  gave  me  that  day 
was  one  of  the  best  I  have  ever  partaken  of  He  gave 
me  some  cognac  which  came  from  his  paternal  home 
in  Lyons,  and  which  dated  from  the  famous  siege  of 
that  city  by  the  Sans-Culottes.  One  has  a  peculiar  feel- 
ing of  gratitude  towards  those  who  in  the  course  of  life 
have  fed  one  well.  But  I  have  other  reasons  for  affec- 
tion for  the  great  composer.  He  is  a  man  of  a  very 
kind  heart.  Some  years  ago  I  was  attending — at  St. 
Ives  in  Cornwall — at  the  sick-bed  of  a  lady  of  my  family 
who  was  dangerously  ill.  One  day  she  was  speaking 
to  me  of  music,  and  of  her  great  admiration  for  Manon 
Lescaut,  Massenet's  opera.  "  I  wish  I  could  hear 
some  of  that  music  now,"  she  said.  I  thought  it  would 
please  her  to  have  the  score  from  Paris,  and  I  wrote 
to  Massenet  and  told  him  the  circumstances,  and  asked 
him  to  tell  his  publisher  to  forward  at  my  charges 
a  certain  Mition  de  luxe  of  the  opera.  By  return  of 
post  the  maestro  sent  me  a  beautiful  copy,  with  the 
kindest  inscription  in  it,  begging  my  acceptance  of  it 
for  my  sick  friend.  Her  delight  at  this  present  helped 
greatly,  I  believe,  in  her  recovery. 

I  often  used  to  go  to  the  office  of  a  publisher  of 
music  in  the  Rue  Vivienne,  where  Massenet  had  a  room, 
and  talk  with  him  about  music  and  musicians.  I  remem- 
ber how  amused  he  was  when  one  day  I  said  to  him, 
"  Tell  me,  maitre,  how  do  these  wonderful  melodies 
come  to  you  ?  Do  you  hear  them  ?  Do  they  gush  forth 
under  your    fingers  as    they  wander  over    the    keys } " 

22 


35S  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

He  said,  "  I  Ikivc  no  piaim  in  the  house  when  I  am 
writing  my  music.  I  si\'  my  melodies  as  I  write  them. 
I  never  try  them  on  the  piano  until  the  whole  score 
is  written." 

He  used  to  tell  me  of  his  great  admiration  for 
Gounod.  He  played  the  cymbals  in  the  orchestra 
at  the  Opera  on  the  first  night  of  Faust,  and  when 
it  was  hissed  he  felt  so  indignant  that  it  was  with 
difficulty  that  he  restrained  himself  from  vaulting  over 
into  the  stalls  and  banging  his  cymbals  about  the  heads 
of  the  people  who  had  dared  to  show  disapproval  of 
a  work  which  he  considered  to  be  one  of  the  finest 
productions  of  musical  genius.  I  expect  that  the  fighting 
spirit  in  'him  was  inherited  from  his  father,  who  was  a 
colonel  in  the  army  of  the  great  Napoleon.  Massenet, 
who  was  born  in  1846,  was  the  twelfth  son  of  this  fine 
old   warrior. 

A    trait    in    his    character  which    specially  appealed 
to   me  Lis  a  literary   man   was   that  he   always  spoke  of 
the  librettist  of  an  opera  as  entitled  at  least  to  a  half- 
share  in  the  credit  of  its  success.     "  I  can  write  no  music 
without   a    poem.     The    book    inspires    me."      On    one 
occasion    he    said,    "  I   wish    that    I    could   find  a  book, 
I    want    to    write    an    opera."     That    the   librettist   was 
entitled    to    half  the    royalties    accruing   from    the   per- 
formances   was    never   for    an    instant   in   doubt   in   the 
composer's  mind.      In  this  respect  much  greater  fairness 
is  shown  in  France  to  authors.      In  England  the  librettist 
has  to   be  satisfied  with  a  fee   which  is    never  a  large 
one.       He    has    never   been    considered    on    any   parity 
with  the  composer.     The  writer  of  words  for  songs  in 
England   contents    himself  with  a  guinea  for  the  copy- 
right   of    his  words,  and   more  often  a  quarter  of  that 
sum  is  considered  sufficient  remuneration  for  him.     In 


AUTHORS'    RIGHTS    IN    FRANCE       339 

France  the  poet  shares  equally  with  the  composer,  and 
so  jealously  are  the  author's  rights  safeguarded  that 
where  a  maker  of  barrel  organs,  for  instance,  makes 
use  of  copyright  tunes  which  were  originally  written 
for  songs,  the  writer  of  the  words  to  which  those  songs 
were  written  receives  half  the  royalties  paid  by  the 
hurdy-gurdy  man.  This  is,  of  course,  as  it  should  be, 
and  I  much  admired  in  Massenet  that  he  so  fully  realised 
its  justice. 

Mounet-Sully,  the  great  tragedian,  who,  with  Sir 
Henry  Irving,^  is  the  greatest  living  artist  (as  distinct 
from  actor)  on  the  stage,  I  came  to  know  personally 
in  a  curious  fashion.  One  night  very  late  I  entered 
into  one  of  those  confectioner's  shops  on  the  Boulevard 
St.  Michel  which  are  known  as  tartines,  where  to 
noctambulous  people  are  dispensed  sandwiches,  milk, 
and,  when  the  police  are  not  in  the  neighbourhood, 
stronger  drinks  served  in  teacups.  Here  I  fell  in  with 
a  tall  dark  man  of  striking  appearance,  whose  magnifi- 
cent eyes  seemed  to  be  affected  by  some  nervous  disorder. 
We  began  to  talk,  and  the  mutual  interest  that  we  took  in 
the  conversation  was  such  that  we  left  the  tartine  together 
and  proceeded  up  the  boulevard  on  a  nightly  stroll. 

The  stranger  talked  to  me  of  children,  the  joy  that 
they  bring  into  a  house,  of  the  utter  desolation  of  those 
who  have  lost  them.  He  spoke  very  tenderly  and  very 
beautifully,  and  after  I  had  left  him  at  the  corner  of  the 
Rue  Gay  Lussac,  I  returned  to  the  shop  to  ask  the  woman 
in  attendance  who  he  was.  "  That  was  Mounet-Sully  of 
the  Comedie  Francaise,"  she  said.  I  could  not  believe 
it.  How  could  I  have  failed  to  recognise  him?  "He 
has  much  changed  of  late,"  she  said.  "  Do  you  not 
remember  the  misfortune  which  befell  him?  He  had 
^  Died  October  13,  1905. 


340  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

two  little  girls,  two  little  darling  children.  They  had 
been  playing  one  afternoon  in  the  Luxembourg  Gardens, 
and  when  they  came  in  they  complained  of  feeling  ill. 
It  was  meningitis,  and  they  were  carried  off  almost  at 
the  siune  hour." 

I  often  used  to  meet  Paul  Mounet,  the  younger 
brother  of  Mounet-Sully,  another  excellent  actor  of  the 
Comedie  Francaise  troupe.  I  remember  meeting  him 
once  outside  his  theatre,  and  he  asked  me  to  come  into 
a  caf^  and  to  explain  the  English  coinage  to  him.  He 
was  going  to  London  with  a  company  of  other  artists 
from  the  Francais,  and  it  was  his  first  visit  to  Enc^land, 
The  enterprise,  it  may  be  remembered,  resulted  in  com- 
plete failure,  and  on  his  return,  whenever  we  met,  he  used 
to  joke  about  his  eagerness  to  study  a  monetary  system 
with  which  he  was  to  enjoy  so  little  familiarity. 

Coquelin  the  elder  I  frequently  used  to  see  at  his 
house  in  the  Rue  Presburg.  I  remember  calling  on 
him,  after  his  return  from  his  first  visit  to  America,  to 
see  the  wonderful  collection  which  he  then  possessed. 
While  he  was  showing  me  his  treasures  he  talked  to 
me  about  his  American  experiences.  He  complained 
that  he  had  been  much  attacked  in  New  York  by  critics 
who  resented  some  article  he  had  written  against  Sir 
Henry  Irving.  Mr.  Winter,  of  the  Tribwie,  who  was 
a  great  friend  of  Irving's,  had  been  "very  severe"; 
the  New  York  Herald  had  boycotted  him  ;  his  name 
was  never  once  mentioned  in  that  paper ;  he  was 
invariably  referred  to  as  the  "  leading  actor."  He 
said  that  it  was  unjust  treatment,  because  he  had  never 
denied  Sir  Henry's  genius.  He  considered  him  a 
perfect  artist ;  but  "  perhaps  you  idolise  him  a  little  too 
much  in  England."  I  told  Coquelin  that  he  could  have 
no  conception  how  we  did  idolise  Sir  Henry. 


HORACE    PORTER'S   LITTLE   JOKE     341 

He  was  full  of  anecdotes  about  the  Americans. 
He  said  that  General  Horace  Porter,  who  spoke 
at  a  gathering  at  the  Century  Club,  was  one  of  the 
funniest  men  he  had  ever  heard,  "His  speech  was 
inimitable,  and  he  kept  us  in  roars  of  laughter  for  fully- 
half  an  hour.  One  of  the  things  he  said  I  remember 
was,  '  The  American  woman  is  like  a  pin.  It  is  her 
head  which  keeps  her  from  getting  lost.'  I  thought 
that  very  good."  He  spoke  with  some  bitterness  of  the 
Comedie  Frangaise,  but  added,  "  Perhaps  when  I  am  an 
old  man  I  shall  make  it  my  '  Invalides.'  But,  en 
attendmit  .   .  ." 

There  was  a  young  man  working  at  an  easel  in 
Coquelin's  drawing-room.  The  actor  presented  me  to 
him.  It  was  Monsieur  Friant,  who  has  since  risen  to  great 
reputation  as  a  painter.  People  who  have  visited  the 
Luxembourg  Gallery  will  remember  his  "  Coming  out  of 
Church."  He  appeared  to  me  a  man  of  versatile  talent 
and  great  knowledge  of  the  technique  of  his  art.  He 
seemed  to  be  attached  to  Coquelin's  establishment  as  a 
kind  of  Court  painter.  I  was  able  to  draw  the  attention 
of  Americans  to  his  work,  and  I  have  sometimes  flattered 
myself  that  I  gave  him  his  first  start,  in  the  commercial 
sense  of  the  word. 

Amongst  many  other  distinguished  painters  with  whom 
I  was  brought  into  frequent  contact  were  Degas,  de  Nittis, 
Cazin,  the  Pizarros,  Jan  van  Beers,  and  the  Stevenses. 
I  was  on  friendly  terms  with  poor  Munkaczy,  who  used 
to  let  me  sit  in  his  gorgeous  studio  and  watch  him  paint. 
I  could  not  but  wonder  why  a  man  of  his  acquired 
wealth  should  wish  to  paint  such  very  bad  pictures. 
I  was  frequently  in  Detaille's  studio  in  the  Boulevard 
Malesherbes.  It  was  a  great  contrast  to  the  studio 
of  the   Hungarian   painter.     It  was  perhaps  the   most 


j,42  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

unpretentious  studio  which  was  to  be  seen  in  Paris.  He 
used  to  talk  to  me  about  his  visits  to  the  Court  of  St. 
Petersburg  and  his  friendship  with  the  Tsar  and  Tsarina. 
Accordinj^  to  Monsieur  Detaille,  the  Emperor 
Ale.xander  was  an  excellent  judge  of  pictures.  "  What 
chiefly  struck  me  in  His  Majesty's  character,"  he  told 
me,  "  is  his  excellent  artistic  understanding.  I  had 
taken  with  me  several  of  my  sketch-books,  and  the 
Tsar  seemed  to  understand  the  developments  of  which 
even  my  crudest  sketches  were  capable.  His  remarks 
were  always  just  and  appropriate,  and  his  criticisms 
very  much  more  intelligible  than  those  of  many  of  the 
great  professional  critics.  He  has  been  very  good  to 
me,"  continued  Monsieur  Detaille.  "  Before  he  came 
to  the  throne  he  used  often  to  visit  my  studio  when 
he  was  in  Paris.  He  is  the  gentlest  and  most  quiet 
of  men." 

On  another  occasion  Detaille  told  me  how  successful 
his  career  had  been  from  the  first.  At  the  same  time  he 
was  well  aware  that  the  critics  were  lying  in  wait  for  him, 
and  that  at  the  slightest  sign  of  weakness  on  his  part 
they  would  be  down  upon  him.  "  To  give  you  a 
Russian  simile,"  he  said,  stooping  down  to  stroke  a 
Russian  sloiighi,  a  present  from  the  Tsarina.  "  If  I  fall 
out  of  the  sledge  the  wolves  who  have  been  following 
waiting  for  their  opportunity  will  be  down  upon  me  in 
a  second." 

Detaille  says  that  our  King  is  one  of  the  worst 
sitters  he  has  ever  known.  "  He  is  so  vivacious,  so 
energetic,  and  so  fond  of  conversation  that  it  is  difficult 
to  do  justice  to  his  portrait."  He  had  had  better  fortune 
with  the  picture  of  the  Duke  of  Connaught. 

One  day  in  1889,  before  the  opening  of  the  Exhibi- 
tion, I  found  him  in  a  state  of  some  annoyance.     "  My 


DETAILLE   AND    HIS   CUSTOMERS 


0^0 


American  clients  are  treating  me  very  badly,"  he  said. 
"  I  was  extremely  anxious,  naturally,  to  be  represented 
at  the  Retrospective  Exhibition  by  my  best  work,  and  I 
asked  my  American  purchasers  to  lend  me  my  paintings 
for  the  purpose,  offering  every  guarantee  in  the  way 
of  insurance  for  their  safe  return.  But,  with  the  ex- 
ception of  the  Corcoran  Gallery,  I  have  met  with  no 
courtesy  from  any  of  my  customers.  I  particularly 
wanted  to  exhibit  my  "  After  Rezonville,"  which  I 
consider  my  best  work,  and  1  begged  Mr.  Vanderbilt 
to  lend  it  to  me.  He  wrote  back  refusing,  but  said  that 
anybody  who  wanted  to  see  it  would  be  admitted  to  his 
gallery  in  New  York  on  presentation  of  my  card.  There 
is  a  great  consolation  for  me  in  that,  is  there  not?  It's 
all  nonsense  to  say  that  a  picture  risks  being  damaged 
in  crossing  the  Atlantic,  and  I  cannot  at  all  understand 
the  motive  of  these  refusals.  I  am  disheartened  and 
disgusted." 

"You  should  do,"  I  suggested,  "what  the  London 
landowners  do  with  their  land.  Monsieur  Detaille.  You 
should  lease  out  your  pictures,  and  refuse  to  sell  them 
outright." 

"That  is  a  good  idea,"  said  the  artist,  "and  it  is 
really  one  which  we  shall  have  to  put  into  execution 
if  this  sort  of  thing  goes  on.  An  artist  works  for  fame 
rather  than  for  money,  and  his  picture  remains  his 
work  although  he  has  sold  it  ten  times  over.  I  have 
already  profited  by  the  lesson  I  have  learned,  and  have 
sold  my  last  pictures  with  the  express  condition  that  I 
can  have  the  use  of  them  for  any  exhibitions  which  may 
take  place.  I  now  look  upon  my  pictures  in  America  as 
buried,  and  it  has  been  suggested  to  me  that  I  should 
represent  the  missing  ones  at  the  exhibition  by  so  many 
coffins." 


344  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

It  has  bocn  the  custom  of  the  yountycr  artists  ever 
since  I  can  remember  to  lautl^h  at  le  pcrc  BoufTuereau. 
Possibly  envy  at  the  large  sums  of  money  which  he 
was  known  to  earn  by  his  brush  and  palette  dictated 
some  of  the  witticisms  which  were  levelled  at  his  head. 
No  doubt  his  style,  and  especially  his  colouring,  which 
were  as  characteristic  as  was  that  of  Henner  in  another 
way.  lent  themselves  to  criticism.  He  painted  to  sell  ; 
he  had  found  out  what  his  rich  clients  wanted,  and  suited 
himself  to  their  taste.  The  man  himself  was  a  simple- 
minded  and  amiable  gentleman.  He  was  fond  of  talking 
of  the  prices  which  his  canvases  produced,  and  told  me 
that  some  picture  in  a  fashionable  New  York  restaurant 
was  his  most  successful  work.  It  had  fetched  the  biggest 
price  which  had  been  paid  for  any  of  his  pictures.  He 
was  usually  at  work  on  some  pink  Venus  emerging  from 
the  sea,  whilst  chocolate-coloured  youths  were  blowing 
in  silver  shells,  and  we  actually  calculated  one  day  how 
much  in  francs  and  centimes  each  minute's  work  of  this 
kind  produced  for  the  fortunate  craftsman.  However, 
the  day  came  when  we  talked  on  another  subject. 

I  had  been  the  friend  of  his  son,  young  Bouguereau, 
the  advocate,  a  bright,  promising  young  fellow.  He  was 
the  last  of  the  painter's  children,  and  he  too  was  carried 
off  by  consumption.  I  used  to  tell  his  father  how  popular 
the  young  man  had  been  amongst  us  all,  what  a  good 
fellow  he  was,  and  how  at  the  Palais  de  Justice  he  had 
been  looked  upon  as  an  advocate  of  the  greatest  promise. 
I  told  him,  too,  in  what  terms  of  affection  the  young 
man  used  to  talk  of  his  parents,  and  how  manfully, 
although  he  was  not  physically  strong,  he  used  to  im- 
pose silence  on  anybody  who  in  Latin  Quarter  caf^ 
discussions  on  art  ventured  to  speak  disrespectfully 
of  le  pere    Bouguereau.      I   think    that    I    was    able   to 


MADAME    MELBA    IN    PARIS         345 

bring  some  comfort  to  the  heart  of  the  sorely  stricken 
father. 

A  delightful  remembrance  will  always  be  that  of 
Melba  when  she  first  came  to  Paris  from  Brussels.  I 
first  saw  her  at  the  Hotel  Scribe  just  after  her  dSbuts  at 
the  Grand  Opera.  She  told  me  that  she  was  "  intensely 
happy."  Her  first  appearance  at  the  Opera  had  been  a 
perfect  triumph,  and  after  the  fourth  act  of  Thomas's 
Hamlet,  she  had  been  recalled  three  times,  which, 
as  Monsieur  Ritt,  the  co-director  of  the  Opera,  told 
me,  had  not  happened  to  any  artist  for  over  thirty 
years.  She  spoke  to  me  of  her  early  beginnings,  and 
gave  Madame  Marchesi  full  credit  for  her  share  in 
her  success.  She  spoke  so  nicely  of  everybody. 
It  was  a  pleasure  to  listen  to  her.  In  Paris  it  is 
malevolent  remarks  which  one  is  usually  called  upon 
to  hear.  She  was  so  grateful  to  Gounod.  "He  has 
always  been  so  kind  about  my  voice,"  she  said.  Then 
she  pointed  to  a  photograph  of  the  composer  which  stood 
on  the  mantelpiece,  and  drew  my  attention  to  what  the 
maestro  had  written  beneath  his  picture:  "  To  the  pretty 
Juliette  for  whom  I  long." 

She  seemed  to  have  pleasant  things  to  say  about  so 
many  people.  "  The  Princess  of  Wales  has  been  very 
good  to  me,  and  I  have  special  reasons  for  gratitude  to 
the  Queen  of  the  Belgians,  who  was  so  very  kind  to  me 
during  my  season  in  Brussels.  She  rarely  missed  one 
of  my  evenings  until  the  death  of  Prince  Rudolph,  and 
whenever  she  came  to  the  Opera  she  used  to  send  for 
me  to  come  to  the  royal  box  and  talk  with  her.  She  is 
very  good  and  clever  about  music."  She  told  me  that 
when  the  papers  were  unkind  about  her  singing  it  made 
her  very  unhappy,  but  she  said,  "  Those  which  are  dis- 
posed to  be  unkind  about  me  here  in  Paris  can  only  find 


346  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

against  mc  tlial  I  am  a  foreigner.  So  I  am.  I  am  an 
Australian  girl,  and  1  am  j)rinicl  of  it."  1  asked  her  if 
she  had  any  secret  for  preserving  and  strengthening  her 
voice.  "  No,"  she  said,  "  I  do  nothing  at  all.  I  take 
care  not  to  talk  too  much  on  the  days  when  I  am  to 
sing  in  the  evening.  My  voice  is  young  and  fresh,  and 
needs  no  artifices.  I  usually  dine  at  four,  and  take  nothing 
more  before  singing.  But  I  make  up  for  that  afterwards, 
and  always  have  a  jolly  good  supper  as  soon  I  get  home." 

I  remember  that  as  we  were  talking,  another  visitor 
was  announced.  This  was  the  theatrical  critic  on  an 
important  Parisian  paper,  who  gave  lessons  in  French. 
Foreign  actresses  who  were  appearing  on  the  Parisian 
stages  found  it  advisable  to  make  use  of  his  professorial 
services.  It  was  the  easiest  way  of  pacifying  the  critic. 
Melba's  early  career  in  Paris  was  not  altogether  smooth. 
There  was  a  rival  prima  donna  on  the  Opera  stage — an 
American — who  waged  war  in  the  press  on  the  Australian 
singer.  One  day  Melba  called  at  my  house  to  show  me, 
with  great  indignation,  some  very  offensive  paragraphs 
which  had  been  printed  about  her  in  Australian  papers, 
and  to  ask  my  advice  as  to  the  best  way  of  answering 
these  attacks.  I  told  Melba — and  the  event  has  proved 
me  right — that  an  artist  like  herself  had  no  need  to 
trouble  about  criticism  of  that  kind.  "  II  n'y  a,  madame, 
que  les  petits  hommes  qui  redoutent  les  petits  ecrits," 
I  said.  I  told  her  that  there  was  no  height  of  artistic 
success  to  which  she  might  not  aspire  and  which  she 
would  not  reach. 

During  a  period  of  twenty  years  I  often  met 
Whistler  in  Paris,  London,  and  Dieppe.  I  was  intro- 
duced to  him  in  1883  by  his  friend  Oscar  Wilde,  and  we 
frequently  dined  together  in  the  grill-room  of  the  Cafe 
Royal.  These  were  memorable  dinners  :  the  two  brightest 


WHISTLER   AND   THE    BORE         347 

wits  of  the  last  century  in  England  were  then  in  the  pleni- 
tude of  their  powers.  Whistler  was  undoubtedly  one  of 
the  greatest  masters  of  repartee  who  has  ever  lived.  His 
reputation,  unlike  that  of  many  wits,  was  not  founded  on 
any  esprit  descalier.  He  said  his  clever  things  at  the 
very  moment  when  they  were  called  for ;  he  did  not 
think,  as  he  was  going  downstairs,  of  the  repartee  he 
might  have  made.  On  the  very  last  occasion  on  which 
I  saw  him — it  was  at  the  Cafe  Napolitain — I  witnessed 
his  encounter  with  a  bore.  "Well,  Mr.  Whistler,  and 
how  are  you  getting  on  ? "  said  the  man,  approaching. 
"  I'm  not,"  said  Whistler,  draining  his  glass  of  absinthe 
and  putting  on  his  hat.  "  I'm  getting  off!"  He  had  a 
way  of  saying  the  simplest  things  which  invested  them 
with  an  air  of  brilliancy.  After  a  scandal  in  London,  in 
which  a  former  friend  of  his  had  been  involved,  I  met  him 
in  the  Bodega,  and  I  said,  "  What  do  you  think  of  all  this, 
Mr.  Whistler?"  He  said,  "Think!  I  never  think." 
There  seems  nothing  in  this  remark  as  one  reads  it ; 
it  was  the  man's  tone,  his  accent,  the  gesture  which 
accompanied  his  words,  which  gave  them  their  peculiar 
appositeness. 

I  remember  how  in  a  similar  way  Oscar  Wilde  had 
been  impressed  by  something  that  Lord  Beaconsfield  had 
said  to  him.  He  had  met  the  Prime  Minister  as  he  was 
coming  away  from  some  gathering  in  London,  and  had 
expressed  the  hope  that  his  lordship  was  very  well.  "  Is 
one  ever  very  well,  Mr.  Wilde?"  said  Lord  Beacons- 
field.  When  Wilde  related  this  incident,  people  used  to 
wonder  what  cleverness  he  could  detect  in  the  remark. 
Here,  again,  it  was  the  tone,  the  accents,  the  gestures  of 
the  speaker  which  made  repartee  of  a  retort. 

Like  all  great  men.  Whistler  had  YvlS.  petitesses.     The 
petits  Merits  of  provincial  journalists  rankled  in  his  mind. 


34^  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

1  fancy  that  early  struj^gles  had  somewhat  embittered  him 
af^ainst  the  critics.  He  seemed  to  believe  in  the  power 
ot  fven  obscure  newspapers  to  affect  an  artist's  reputa- 
tion. I  have  seen  him  angry  at  something  which  had 
appeared  in  some  such  paper  as  the  Stoke  Poges  Enquirer. 
One  used  to  fancy  he  was  jesting,  but  the  fact  was  that 
even  the  obscurest  writer  could  inflict  a  wound  on  his 
almost  morbid  self-esteem.' 

I  remember  the  fact  that  I  once  had  a  long  conversa- 
tion with  him  in  his  atelier  in  the  Rue  Notre  Dame  des 
Petits  Champs,  but  little  beyond  that.  He  was  fencing 
with  me  the  whole  time.  I  represented  to  him  the  "  in- 
terviewer," although  I  had  called  upon  him  with  no  such 
intentions,  and  he  said,  "  You  must  not  try  it  on  with  me. 
Just  before  I  left  London,"  he  added,  "  there  met  me  one 
who  tried  to  beguile  me,  and  who  said,  '  How  do  you  do, 
Mr.  Whistler  ? '  in  a  lamb-like  manner,  and  I  said,  *  No, 
no,  no !  No,  really  I  have  nothing  to  say.  There  will 
be  a  time  doubtless,  some  day  later  on,  when  there  will 
be  charming  things  to  be  said,  but  it  isn't  now  ;  no,  it  isn't 
now."  I  remember  that  he  talked  to  me  for  upwards  of 
an  hour,  as  he  knew  how  to  talk  ;  but  even  when  I  had 
parted  from  him,  and  tried  to  remember  the  things  that 
had  been  spoken,  all  was  intangible,  like  in  a  dream. 
There  were  the  things  that  I  had  said  to  Mr.  Whistler, 
but  where  was  what  Mr.  Whistler  had  said  to  me  ? 
There  were  smiles  and  laughter,  and  many  things  which 
were  "  charming  and  so  on,"  and  that  was  all. 

I  have  often  since  thought  of  that  visit  and  that  hour's 
conversation  with  the  great  man.      And  when  I  think  of 

*  Michelet,  speaking  of  artists,  says,  "  L'artiste  est  un  homme-feinme. 
Je  veux  dire  un  homme  complet,  qui  ayant  les  deux  sexes  de  I'esprit,  est 
fecond  ;  toutes  fois  presque  toujours  avec  predominance  de  la  sensibilite 
irritable  et  colerique." 


THE    "NEC    PLUS    ULTRA"  349 

it,  I  remember  that  as  I  was  going  up  to  his  studio, 
which  was  very  high  up,  having  lost  count  of  the  storeys 
I  had  cHmbed,  I  met  a  fat  bojirgeois  coming  down  the 
stairs,  and  asked  to  be  directed.  "  You  must  go  right  up 
to  the  top  of  the  staircase,"  he  said  cheerfully.  "  On 
ne  peut  pas  aller  plus  loin  que  Monsieur  Whistler  " — a 
remark  which  was  both  an  epigram  and  a  true  appreciation. 


CHAPTER   XXI 

Journalism  in  France— Contrasted  with  Journalism  in  England— Black- 
mailers— How  a  Provincial  Journal  was  Founded — A  Fighting  Editor 
— "  Les  Feuilles  Soumises" — Editing  Provincial  Journals — Charles 
Baudelaire  as  an  Editor — The  French  Newspaper-reader — Serial 
Stories — The  Masters  of  the  Art — Drawing  Pay — The  Editor  of  Le 
Figaro — The  Circulations  Over  a  Million — And  Under  Five  Hundred 
— How  Dead  Papers  are  kept  Alive — Some  Able  Editors — Aurdlien 
Scholl — Henri  Rochefort. 

IT  used  to  be  a  saying  in  France  that  journalism  led 
to  everything,  provided  that  one  quitted  the  career. 
That  has  altered  now.  Journalism  still  leads  to  every- 
thing in  France  and  there  is  no  necessity  to  abandon 
it.  Indeed,  men  vv^ho  have  reached  the  highest  points 
to  which  their  careers  can  lead  any  man  find  satisfac- 
tion and  profit  in  maintaining  their  relations  with  the 
press  as  workers.  When  Zola  was  earning  ^8,000  a 
year,  he  did  not  disdain  to  contribute  articles  to  the 
papers  ;  Clemenceau,  although  he  is  a  senator,  is  a  daily 
contributor  to  the  Aurore  ;  and  the  most  famous  politicians 
in  France  temporarily  removed  fi-om  power  are  glad  to 
return,  not  like  Thiers,  to  their  chh^es  dtudes,  but  to  the 
journalistic  labours  by  which  they  first  attracted  attention 
to  themselves. 

Journalism  has  always  ranked  in  France  higher  than 
it  has  ever  stood  in  England,  where  even  to-day  the 
profession  is  regarded  without  much  esteem.  I  was 
reading  the   other  day  a  biography  of  that   unfortunate 

350 


DOCTOR   DODD'S    EDITORSHIP       351 

divine,  Dr.  Dodd,  and  I  came  across  a  passage  where 
it  was  said  that  after  his  return  in  disgrace  from  France, 
whither  he  had  fled  after  his  dismissal  from  Court  on  a 
charge  of  simony,  he  might  still  have  retrieved  his 
character,  "  had  he  not  sunk  so  low  as  to  become  the 
editor  of  a  newspaper." 

Prejudice  has  diminished  in  England  since  those 
days,  but  it  is  still  not  unusual  to  hear  the  profession 
spoken  of  with  contempt.  In  France  the  gazetteer  has 
always  enjoyed  consideration  rather  than  obloquy.  To 
be  attached  to  an  important  paper  confers  decided  social 
distinction  on  a  man.  This  is  not  because  journalists 
are  better  remunerated  in  France  than  they  are  in 
England,  for  the  contrary  is  the  case.  The  pay  of  the 
ordinary  working  journalist  in  Paris  is  comparatively 
very  low  indeed. 

I  was  speaking  some  time  ago  with  the  leader  writer 
on  the  principal  French  evening  paper  about  the  salaries 
paid  in  France  and  in  England,  and  he  told  me  that  his 
salary  for  his  exclusive  daily  services  on  this  important 
and  wealthy  paper,  in  which  all  subjects  are  treated 
in  the  most  scholarly  style,  was  ^^24  a  month, 
which  is  less  than  a  good  reporter  can  earn  in  Fleet 
Street.  A  large  majority  of  the  writers  to  the  Parisian 
press  are  remunerated  with  so  much  a  line  for  such 
articles  of  theirs  as  are  inserted.  There  are  some 
very  few  men  who  are  earning  ^1,000  or  ^2,000  a 
year,  but  these  are  men  who  have  won  distinction  in 
other  fields.  It  is  said  that  for  one  of  his  political 
articles  in  the  Journal  Poincare  receives  £i\o,  but 
then  Poincare  is  an  ex-Minister.  Articles  of  similar 
length  by  obscure  men  would  be  remunerated  with  a 
sovereign  or  thirty  shillings.  The  lineage  rates  vary 
from  a  halfpenny  to  twopence  halfpenny  a  line.     Magazine 


352  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

articles,  such  as  in  England  are  paid  for  with  /^lo, 
/15.  <^^r  /^20,  would  bring  in  Paris  not  half  the 
smallest  sum. 

On  the  Rcz'ne  des  deux  Mondcs  the  rule  used  to 
be  that  no  first  article  by  any  new  contributor  was  paid 
for,  and  none  but  tlie  few  ever  succeeded  in  placing  a 
second  one.  But  in  Latin  countries  the  commercial 
spirit  does  not  sway  public  opinion  as  it  does  in  P2ngland 
and  America,  and  if  the  journalist  in  France  enjoys  a 
social  distinction  which  is  refused  to  his  colleague  in 
Anglo-Saxon  countries  it  is  because  in  France  talent  of 
any  kind  takes  precedence  on  mere  wealth.  When 
Mrs.  Mackay  quarrelled  with  Meissonier,  Albert  Wolff 
wrote  an  article  in  the  Figaro,  which  well  expressed  the 
general  opinion  in  Prance  on  the  relative  position  of 
talent  and  wealth.  "  Millionaires,"  he  wrote,  "  are  to 
be  numbered  by  the  score  in  Paris,  but  we  have  only 
one  Meissonier." 

I  remember  a  long  conversation  which  I  had  with 
Magnard,  the  editor  of  the  Figaro,  on  this  subject.  I 
had  called  on  him,  by  his  invitation,  shortly  after  my 
encounter  with  him  at  Countess  Kessler's  house.  I 
remember  saying  to  him,  "  Journalists  have  a  better 
position  in  society  in  Paris  than  in  any  other  country 
in  Europe.  Is  not  that  so?"  His  answer  was,  "Yes. 
We  cannot  complain.  On  the  whole  the  social  position 
of  a  journalist  in  France  is  an  excellent  one.  A  few 
very  lofty  leaders  of  society  do,  it  is  true,  affect  to  keep 
the  journalist  at  a  distance,  but  their  number  is  too 
small  for  consideration."  Arthur  Meyer,  of  the  Gaulois, 
has  the  entrde  into  the  most  exclusive  society  of  the 
Boulevard  St.  Germain,  and  it  should  be  remembered 
that  in  Paris  the  nobility  are  much  more  exclusive 
than  in   any  other  country  in  the  world.     The  foreign 


CORRESPONDENTS   AND   SOCIETY     353 

correspondent  who  takes  the  trouble  to  procure  proper 
introductions  can  ^ain  admission  to  the  best  circles  in 
Paris,  and  I  have  often  wondered  why  so  very  few 
ever  do  trouble  to  do  so. 

To  the  French  tradesman,  it  must  be  admitted,  the 
journalist  is  ever  an  object  of  suspicion.  The  reason 
of  that  is  that  journalists  being  badly  paid  for  their 
literary  work  are  always  on  the  look-out  for  the  better 
remuneration  which  they  can  earn  as  advertisement 
canvassers,  and  if  the  French  tradesman  dreads  the 
approach  of  any  man  known  to  be  connected  with  a 
newspaper  it  is  because  he  fears  that  he  may  unwittingly 
be  drawn  into  an  expensive  advertising  bargain.  A 
general  opinion  in  this  class  is  that  for  money  anything 
can  be  inserted  in  a  French  newspaper.  The  suspicion 
is  not  altogether  unwarranted.  There  are  too  many 
papers  in  France  which  will  print  anything,  provided 
their  price  be  paid. 

I  remember  once  accompanying  a  London  solicitor 
to  the  office  of  a  well-known  Parisian  literary  daily  to 
which,  at  that  time,  the  foremost  writers  in  F" ranee  used 
to  contribute.  He  was  anxious  to  procure  the  insertion 
of  an  article  in  this  paper.  I  understood  that  it  was  an 
article  dealing  with  the  grievances  of  one  of  his  clients, 
a  lady  who  was  suing  for  divorce  against  her  husband. 

The  case  was  one  which  was  attracting  great  attention 
in  Touraine.  I  merely  acted  in  the  matter  as  the 
solicitor's  guide  and  interpreter.  He  had  been  introduced 
to  me  by  a  mutual  friend.      I  presented  him  to  Monsieur 

G ,  who  was   at   that  time   the  editor  of  the  paper, 

and  told  him  what  was  required  of  him.  He  said, 
"  Let    me   look    at   the   article."     The  solicitor  handed 

him     the    manuscript.       Monsieur    G examined    it 

through  his  monocle,   then  folded  it  up,  and,  letting  his 

23 


354  TWKXTV    VI-ARS    IN    PARIS 

eyeglass  drop,  saiJ.  "  Thai  will  cost  three;  thousand 
francs."  The  soHcitor  asked  me  to  say  that  he  thought 
the  sum  too  large.  I  translated  these  remarks  to  the 
editor,  who  then  said  to  me,  "  Mave  you  read  what  he 
wants  us  to  j)rini  ?  "  I  answered  that  I  had  no  idea  of 
the  nature  of  the  article. 

Monsieur   G then   handed    me    the   manuscript. 

It  was  a  scandalous  article,  a  series  of  foul  libels  about 
the  woman's  husband.  "  Well,  is  three  thousand  francs 
too  dear  ?  "  said  the  editor.  I  simply  handed  the  paper 
back  to  him  and  walked  out  of  the  office.  In  my 
absence  the  solicitor  and  the  editor  came  to  terms,  for 
a  few  days  later  the  article  duly  appeared.  The  result 
was  that  the  husband  brought  an  action  for  libel 
against  the  paper,  and  recovered  ^20  damages.  That 
sum,  with  the  costs  of  the  suit,  however,  came  out  of 
the  pockets  of  the  shareholders  :  the  editor  benefited  to 
the  extent  of  three  thousand  francs. 

In  connection  with  that  case,  I  had  previously  gained 
a  curious  insight  into  one  branch  of  provincial  journalism 
in  France.  I  had  been  asked  by  the  friend  who  afterwards 
introduced  me  to  the  solicitor,  to  whom  I  have  referred, 
to  go,  as  an  act  of  friendship,  to  the  town  where  the 
woman's  husband  lived,  and  try  to  close  the  mouth  of 
a  local  editor,  who  was  attacking  her  in  his  paper.  It 
was  said  that  it  was  the  husband  who  was  inspiring 
these  attacks  and  paying  for  them. 

I  accordingly  went  to  the  town  in  the  centre  of 
France  and  saw  the  editor  of  the  paper.  I  telegraphed 
back  to  my  friend  in  London  that  "  it  was  only  a  question 
of  money."  I  was  then  asked  to  make  the  best  terms 
I  could  for  the  woman.  I  eventually  arranged  with  the 
editor  that  for  a  monthly  payment  of  ^8  a  month  from 
London    he    would    gradually    modify    the    tone    of  his 


BUYING   AN    EDITOR  355 

articles  on  the  affaire  X.,  and  in  the  end  come  over  to 
the  wife's  side.  But  he  said  it  could  only  be  done  very 
gradually.  After  the  first  payment  had  been  made  the 
tone  of  the  articles  was  certainly  modified,  but  the 
subsequent  process  of  modification  was  so  very  slow 
that  the  solicitor  considered  that  his  client  was  not 
getting  her  money's  worth,  and  refused  the  fourth 
remittance. 

Some  days  later  I  received  a  communication  from 
the  town  in  the  centre  of  France,  which  was  made  up 
of  printed  letters  cut  from  a  newspaper  and  pasted  on 
a  sheet  of  paper,  telling  me  that  no  money  had  been 
received  from  London,  and  adding  that  if  money  did 
not  come  at  once,  "the  other  side  of  the  question  would 
be  taken  up  with  greater  vigour  than  ever." 

I  was  curious  to  see  the  thing  through,  and  I  returned 

to  T .     The  editor   told   me  that  he  had  done  his 

best,  but  that  he  was  hampered  by  the  fact  that  the 
proprietor  of  the  paper  was  one  of  the  husband's  friends, 
and  that  it  would  be  more  than  his  place  was  worth  for 
him  to  espouse  the  wife's  cause  in  a  more  effective 
manner.  I  then  called  on  the  proprietor,  and  appealed 
to  his  sense  of  honour  and  gallantry,  and  I  did  not  leave 
him  until  I  had  extracted  a  sort  of  promise  that  she 
should  be  spared  in  the  future  in  his  columns.  A  hint 
was,  however,  conveyed  to  me  that  the  best  way  of 
pacifying  the  proprietor  of  the  paper  would  be  to  invest 
in  a  certain  number  of  shares  in  the  paper. 

In  communicating  this  to  London,  I  suggested  that 
it  would  be  very  much  cheaper  to  start  an  opposition 
paper,  entirely  devoted  to  the  wife's  interests.  I  was 
afterwards  asked  to  arr^mge  for  the  production  of  such  a 
paper.  I  went  straight  off  to  the  Cafe  des  Martyrs,  which 
1  knew  to  be  the  rendezvous  of  journalistic  free-lances. 


356  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

and  aftcT  makiiiL;'  a  lew  inquiries  found  the  man  I 
wanted.  He  was  a  journalist  of  some  ability,  but  he 
was  specially  recommended  to  me  as  having  once  killed 
a  man  in  a  pistol  duel.  This  man  undertook  to  produce 
a  large  four-page  weekly  paper  for  the  sum  of   ;({^I2  a 

week,   and   very   shortly   afterwards  the  city  of  T 

was  endowed  with  a  new  paper,  which  lived  just  as  long 
as  the  affaire  X.  lasted. 

One  might  write  a  long  chapter  on  press  blackmail- 
ing in  France.  Indeed,  the  things  which  Monsieur  de 
Lesseps  told  me  about  his  experiences  of  this  would 
make  a  book  ;  but  the  subject  is  an  unpleasant  one,  and 
I  will  say  no  more.  The  weekly  sum  for  which  my 
provincial  editor  undertook  to  produce  his  weekly  paper 
seems  incredibly  small,  when  it  is  remembered  that  he 
had  to  Qret  his  livins:  out  of  the  allowance  ;  but  in  France 
it  seems  possible  to  found  a  paper  and  to  keep  it  going 
on  very  small  capital  indeed.  What  would  be  thought 
in  Fleet  Street  if  a  man  were  to  start  a  daily  paper  in 
London  with  a  capital  of  ^1,200?  Yet  this  is  exactly 
the  sum  with  which  the  poet  Camille  de  Sainte-Croix 
started  his  La  Rdvolte,  a  daily  Parisian  paper.  It 
lasted  just  thirty  days,  at  the  rate  of  a  thousand  francs 
a  day. 

The  provincial  newspaper  proprietor  in  France  has 
a  resource  which  his  Parisian  colleague  often  has  not. 
He  is  subsidized  by  one  or  other  of  the  local  political 
parties.  Often  he  is  in  the  pay  of  the  Government. 
His  paper  is  what  Rochefort  calls  tme  feiiille  souviise, 
and  is  edited  from  the  prefecture  of  his  department. 
In  some  cases  the  provincial  printer  and  publisher  carries 
on  the  publication  of  a  weekly  or  bi-weekly  organ  with 
no  other  object  in  view  than  to  lease  out  its  columns 
to  any  local  politician  whose  temporary  ambitions  may 


BUYING   A   NEWSPAPER   IN    PART     357 

make  it  necessary  for  him  to  have  a  representative  organ 
in  the  district  for  a  certain  period.  One  could  name  a 
score  of  such  provincial  papers  in  France  which  change 
their  political  colour  as  may  be  dictated  by  the  business 
manager  and  his  contracts. 

A  year  or  two  ago  an  amusing  case  was  tried  in  the 
French  courts,  which  shows  how  entirely  the  provincial 
newspaper  proprietor  looks  upon  the  political  opinions 
expressed  in  his  paper  as  a  matter  of  business.  In  this 
case  the  Royalist  senator  Monsieur  Provost  de  Launay 
was  the  plaintiff  and  the  proprietor  of  a  certain  local 
newspaper  was  the  defendant.  The  statement  of  claim 
set  forth  that  by  an  agreement  between  the  parties  the 
plaintiff  had  hired  the  whole  front  page  of  the  paper  in 
question,  to  be  filled  with  matter  advocating  his  political 
views  and  advertising  his  personal  merits.  The  de- 
fendant had  kept  his  bargain,  but  had  subsequently 
leased  out  the  third  page  for  the  same  purposes  to  the 
Government  candidate,  Monsieur  de  Launay's  opponent. 
On  the  front  page  the  paper  was  Royalist,  on  the 
third  page  it  was  Republican.  The  Court  held  that  the 
publisher  was  quite  within  his  rights  in  disposing  of 
his  space  to  the  best  advantage  to  himself 

Many  provincial  papers  of  this  class  are  edited  from 
Paris.  The  editor  never  visits  the  place  of  publication. 
I  remember  how  a  friend  of  mine,  an  unsuccessful 
dramatic  author,  developed  into  a  person  of  affluence. 
He  had  been  engaged  to  edit  from  Paris  a  paper  devoted 
to  the  political  interests  of  a  local  politician.  He  did 
the  thing  so  well  from  Paris  that  the  paper  actually  was 
made  to  pay.  The  townsmen  declared  that  never  had 
their  local  interests  been  better  defended.  I  used  to 
see  him  writing  his  leaders  in  the  Cafe  de  la  Sorbonne, 
and  he  claimed  that  it  was  instinct  which  prompted  him 


358  TWENTY    YEARS    IN    PARIS 

ever  to  take  up  the  popular  side  in  any  local  question. 
"  P'or  instance,"  I  once  heard  him  say,  "  the  to\vnspe()j)lc; 
are  divided  on  the  question  of  spending  a  large  sum  of 
money  on  improving  their  water  supply.  It  is  obvious 
that  the  drinking  of  too  much  water  is  an  abuse — bad 
for  the  health,  contrary  to  the  best  interests  of  the 
Republic,  and  must  injure  the  trade  of  the  vine-growers 
and  marchands  de  vins.  I  therefore  oppose  the  scheme. 
Garcon.  un  bock  !  " 

On  the  other  hand,  when  Rene  Leclerc,  the  poor 
poet  to  whom  I  have  already  alluded,  went  to  Savoy  to 
edit  the  paper  of  a  candidate  in  one  of  the  towns  there, 
his  career  was  as  short  as  ithat  of  another  poet,  Charles 
Baudelaire,  under  similar  circumstances.  On  the  day 
of  Baudelaire's  arrival  in  the  town  in  which  the  new 
paper  was  to  appear,  he  was  entertained  at  dinner  by 
the  committee  of  shareholders,  and  during  the  dinner 
never  once  opened  his  mouth.  When  towards  the  end 
of  the  banquet  his  silence  was  commented  upon,  he 
replied,  "  You  have  brought  me  down  here  to  be  the 
lackey  of  your  intelligence.  I  am  not  paid  to  talk  to 
you."  And  the  next  day,  on  visiting  the  printing-office, 
he  horrified  the  printer's  wife  by  asking  first  of  all,  as 
the  most  important  point  to  be  considered,  "  Where  do 
you  keep  the  editorial  brandy-bottle  ?  " 

In  considering  the  small  amount  of  capital  which  is 
considered  sufficient  in  Paris  to  start  a  daily  paper,  it 
must  be  remembered  that  foreign  news  is  still  the  service 
to  which  French  editors  pay  the  least  attention.  Ville- 
messant,  the  founder  of  the  Figaro,  had  an  absolute 
contempt  for  foreign  news.  "  The  Parisian,"  he  used 
to  say,  "is  far  more  interested  in  an  account  of  how  a 
dog  was  run  over  in  the  Chauss^e  d'Antin  than  in  the 
fall  of  a  dynasty  abroad."     The  best  Parisian  paper  in 


INDIFFERENCE    TO   FOREIGN    NEWS     359 

his  days  was,  as  he  demonstrated,  the  paper  which  gave 
the  fullest  local  news. 

In  England,  of  course,  we  take,  or  are  presumed  to 
take,  enormous  interest  in  foreign  affairs,  and  the  result 
is  that  newspaper  proprietors  have  to  spend  very  large 
sums  on  this  service,  I  remember  speaking  with  a 
London  newspaper  proprietor,  who  told  me  that  on 
starting  his  paper  he  had  calculated  upon  spending  a 
quarter  of  a  million  sterling  before  he  should  "turn  the 
corner."  "As  a  matter  of  fact,"  he  added,  "I  had  to 
spend  much  more  than  that ;  for  we  started  at  a  time 
when  there  were  three  wars  going  on,  and  thousands 
of  pounds  weekly  had  to  be  paid  out  for  foreign  corre- 
spondence." 

Of  late,  however,  there  has  been  a  marked  change 
in  French  journalism  in  this  respect,  and  some  enter- 
prise is  being  shown  in  the  matter  of  foreign  news. 
Some  of  the  Parisian  papers  now  do  send  correspondents 
to  the  front ;  but  these  are  allowed  to  proceed  in  a 
leisurely  way.  The  editor  seems  to  prefer  to  receive 
a  well-written  account  of  a  battle  months  after  the  event, 
than  to  "scoop"  the  news  of  a  victory.  I  was  much 
amused  a  few  days  ago  by  reading  the  remarks  with 
which  a  correspondent  in  Tokio  explained  why  he  had 
not  been  sending  much  news  for  some  time  previously. 
He  described  the  voluptuous  atmosphere  of  the  extreme 
East,  and  deplored  the  enervating  effects  of  the  climate 
and  the  other  seductions  of  Japan — all  so  hostile  to 
literary  work.  I  imagined  the  face  of  a  news  editor  in 
New  York  or  in  London  on  reading  such  a  message 
from  a  correspondent  at  the  front,  and  could  see  before 
me  as  plain  as  print  that  news  editor's  prescription  for 
curing  this  want  of  tone. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  the  French   newspaper  reader 


o 


60  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 


cares  little  or  nothing  for  foreign  news.  He  has  no 
notion  of  geography  ;  he  does  not  know  where  the 
places  are  which  are  mentioned  under  the  heading  of 
"  Etranger."  My  housekeeper  is  a  very  intelligent 
woman,  who  can  write  an  admirable  business  letter  and 
knows  all  about  French  affairs  ;  but  she  has  no  more 
idea  as  to  the  position  of  Belgium  or  of  Switzerland  than 
I  have  of  the  inner  architecture  of  the  Forbidden  City 
in  Pekin.  The  other  day  she  asked  me  if  Scotland  were 
an  island !  What  your  French  newspaper  reader  turns 
to  first  is  the  Faits-divers,  or  local  news.  But  his  primary 
object  in  buying  the  paper  is  to  read  the  feuilleton,  or 
serial  story.  Monsieur  Cassigneul,  the  manager  of  the 
Petit  Jotimal,  insisted  upon  this  in  a  long  conversation 
I  once  had  with  him  in  his  room  at  the  office  of  the 
paper.  "  Our  serials  have  an  immense  effect  on  the  sale 
of  our  paper,"  he  said.  "  Most  of  our  million  purchasers 
buy  the  paper  for  the  sake  of  i\\&  feuilleton  alone ;  so  we 
pay  high  prices  to  our  novelists.  I  think  that  Xavier  de 
Montepin  received  the  highest  price  we  have  ever  paid 
for  a  serial — namely,  ;!^2,8oo." 

I  remember  asking  Monsieur  de  Montepin  about  his 
gains,  and  he  said  that,  in  addition  to  the  seventy  thousand 
francspaid  himfor  that  particular  story  bythe  Petit  Journal, 
he  had  received  ;/^2,ooo  more  from  the  firm  of  Jules 
Rouff  &  Co.  for  the  right  of  reproducing  it  in  weekly 
numbers,  and  that  this  firm  had  spent  ;^8,ooo  in  adver- 
tising those  weekly  numbers.  De  Montepin,  who  was  a 
fine  aristocratic  old  gentleman,  lived  in  a  splendid  mansion 
in  Passy,  which  was  filled  with  the  most  expensive  and 
most  worthless  of  modern  pictures.  He  was  very  proud 
of  his  name  and  family,  and  his  greatest  pleasure  in 
life  was  to  ride  in  the  Bois.  He  told  me  that  he  had 
been   successful  from  the  very    first,    and    that    he   had 


A   WRITER   OF   SERIALS  361 

written  five  hundred  novels,  which  had  all  paid  exceedingly- 
well.      He  hoped  to  live  to  write  as  many  more. 

Another  writer  of  serial  stories  who  made  a  large 
fortune  was  Emile  Richebourg.  At  one  time  he  was  a 
clerk  in  the  office  of  the  Societe  des  Gens  de  Lettres, 
and  had  been  impressed  with  the  large  sums  of  money 
which  he  had  had  to  pay  over  the  counter  to  the  authors 
of  popular  fiction  who  came  to  the  office  to  receive  their 
droits  d'mttettr.  "  I  was  curious  to  see,"  he  once  told 
me,  as  we  were  lunching  together  in  his  villa  at  Bougival, 
"  what  sort  of  stuff  it  was  that  brought  in  such  huge 
royalties,  and  I  set  myself  the  task  of  reading  some  of 
these  serials.  I  came  to  the  conclusion  that  I  could  write 
as  well  myself,  and  in  the  evenings,  after  office  hours,  I 
worked  at  a  story.  It  was  submitted  to  the  Petit  Journal, 
and  was  accepted,  and  my  reputation  and  fortune  were 
made." 

The  reader  for  the  Petit  Journal  was  the  wife  of 
Monsieur  Marinoni.  Marinoni,  who  rose  to  great 
wealth,  had  started  in  life  as  a  workman  in  a  printing 
office.  His  wife  was  a  woman  of  the  people.  As  the 
Petit  Journal  appealed  to  the  people,  Marinoni  decided 
that  his  wife  would  be  the  best  taster  that  he  could  find 
for  the  stories  submitted  for  his  acceptance.  Madame 
Marinoni  had  an  excellent y?<a;zV  in  this  field,  and  it  is  said 
that  she  would  recommend  no  serial,  in  the  course  of 
reading  which  she  had  not  been  moved  to  tears  at  least 
once  in  every  seven  instalments. 

To-day  there  are  a  large  number  of  men  making  big 
incomes  by  work  of  this  kind.  I  was  introduced  not  long 
ago,  at  one  of  the  best  clubs  in  Paris,  to  a  retired  army 
officer — a  most  distinguished  man — whose  interests  in  life 
seemed  to  be  exclusively  confined  to  sport.  I  was  after- 
wards told  of  him  that  he  was  earning  eighty  thousand 


o 


62  TWENTY   Vr. ARS    IN    PARIS 


francs  a  year  l)y  w  riling;  srtisational  fiction  for  the  Parisian 
papers,  and  that  by  dictatinq^  his  matter  to  a  typist  he 
was  always  free  of  his  daily  task  before  lunch.  I  do  not 
think  that  many  members  of  the  club  where  I  met  him 
have  any  idea  of  the  source  whence  he  derived  his  big 
income.  He  had  not  the  childish  vanity  of  Eugene  Sue, 
who  distrusted  the  members  of  the  Jockey  Club  with  his 
boastings  about  the  amounts  he  could  earn  with  his  pen, 
and  who  used  to  sit  in  the  smoking-room  of  that  select 
assembly  correcting  the  proofs  of  his  Wandering  Jew. 

During  my  life  in  Paris  I  have  been  brought  into 
contact  with  most  of  the  editors  of  the  Parisian  press. 
At  a  very  early  stage  in  my  career  I  was  invited  by  one 
editor  to  contribute  on  English  and  American  subjects 
to  his  paper,  a  journal  which  was  originally  founded  by 
Victor  Hugo.  I  need  hardly  say  with  what  pride  I  trod 
the  boulevards  that  evening.  My  satisfaction  was,  how- 
ever, to  be  short-lived,  for  in  the  course  of  my  walk  I  fell 
in  with  a  well-known   Parisian  c/ironiqtietir,  who,  when  I 

had  told  him  of  Mr.    L s  offer,  cried  out,   "  Have 

nothing  to  do  with  him.  Don't  put  yourself  into  that 
robber's  cave."  Then  he  led  me  to  a  passage  which  ran 
alongside  the  building  in  which  the  offices  of  the  paper 
were  situated,  and  pointed  out  to  me  a  door  which  opened 
directly  on  to  a  steep  flight  of  steps.     "  That,"  he  said, 

"  is  the  staircase  down  which  Mr.  L comes  whenever 

any  of  his  contributors  go  to  the  office  by  the  front 
door  for  their  payment."  A  little  later  we  met  Aurelien 
Scholl — it  was  my  introduction  to  him — and  he  cried  out, 

"Mr.    L !     Why,   when   I   deliver  a  manuscript  to 

him  I  hold  it  out  with  my  left  hand  whilst  stretching  out 
my  right,  and  I  don't  leave  go  of  the  manuscript  until  he 
has  handed  me  the  price  agreed  upon." 

In  Paris,   by  the  way,  the  staff  and  contributors  are 


DRAWING   PAY  363 

never  paid  by  post.  One  is  expected  to  go  once  a  week 
or  once  a  month  to  the  cashier's  office  and  get  one's 
money,  just  as  the  "  Hners  "  do  in  Fleet  Street.  Even 
the  great  men  on  the  press  have  to  follow  this  rule,  and 
you  may  see  at  the  cash-office  the  world-known  chroniqueiir 
languidly  pocketing  his  thousand-franc  notes  side  by  side 
with  the  occasional  reporter,  who  is  eagerly  picking  up 
the  pence  for  so  many  lines  at  a  halfpenny  a  line.  I 
remember  how,  after  my  first  contribution  to  a  Parisian 
newspaper  had  appeared,  I  was  surprised  at  receiving  no 
cheque.  I  wrote  to  the  manager,  but  my  letter  was  left 
without  an  answer.  Finally  I  presented  myself  at  the 
cash-office,  and  inquired  why  my  money  had  not  been 
forwarded.  The  system  was  then  explained  to  me. 
"  Your  money  has  been  waiting  for  you  here  for  some 
weeks,"  said  the  cashier,  pushing  over  an  envelope  to 
me  and  handing  me  a  book  in  which  to  sign.  "  You  will 
find  the  amount  correct — three  hundred  and  sixteen  lines 
at  threepence  a  line."  I  don't  think  that  the  receipt  of 
money  ever  gave  me  more  pleasure.  I  felt  myself  indeed 
a  worker,  a  proletarian — a  man  who  for  work  done  was 
receiving  his  wage.  It  is  a  pleasure  to  sign  a  pay-sheet. 
It  seems  to  invest  one  with  dignity.  It  dispels  that 
feeling  which  sometimes  haunts  the  writer,  that  he  is  but 
a  parasite  on  the  body  social. 

Mr.  L was  an  exception  among  Parisian  editors, 

as  I  found  them.  I  have  spoken  of  my  first  meeting 
with  Magnard.  When  I  knew  him  better  I  lost  all 
feeling  of  grievance  against  him.  He  was,  indeed,  rather 
a  kindly  hearted  man,  but  rough  and  without  manners. 
I  used  to  be  amused  at  the  terror  in  which  he  always 
stood  of  De  Villemessant  long  after  his  chiefs  death. 
It  reminded  me  of  that  passage  in  Vanity  Fair, 
where  Thackeray  describes  how   an    old  gentleman  of 


364  TWl-X'lV   YF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

sixty-eight  c.imc  down  to  breakfast  one  morning  pale 
and  scared,  and  said.  "  I   dreamt  last   night  that   I   was 

birched   by    Dr.   X ."      IVlagnard  often    said    to   me, 

"  I  keep  wondering  whether  De  Villemessant  is  satisfied. 
We  often  say,  '  What  a  good  thing  it  is  that  there  is  no 
telephone  from  the  other  world!  He  would  always  be 
ringing  us  up.  He  was  very  particular,  very  difficult  to 
please.  His  strictness  applied  to  other  things  besides 
our  work.  He  used  to  insist  that  we  should  be  as  careful 
about  our  dress  as  about  our  work.  We  all  have  a  religious 
respect  for  his  principles,  and  try  to  please  him,  though 
he  is  no  more.  In  the  old  days,  when  anything  in  the 
paper  pleased  him,  he  used  to  cut  it  out  and  pin  it  up  on 
that  board  to  serve  as  a  model  to  the  others." 

The  last  time  when  I  met  Magnard  was  at  the  break- 
fast given  to  Zola  on  the  island  in  the  Bois  de  Boulogne 
on  the  occasion  of  the  completion  of  the  Rougon-Mac- 
quart  series  of  novels.  At  that  time  Villemessant's  paper 
was  still  at  the  height  of  its  prosperity.  The  shares  then 
stood  at  more  than  double  their  present  value.  It  was 
the  attitude  taken  up  during  the  Affah^e  Dreyfus  which 
brought  about  the  downfall  of  the  Figaro.  But  Magnard 
did  not  live  to  see  the  decline  of  the  paper  which  was, 
under  his  rdgwie,  the  foremost  journal  on  the  Continent. 
It  is  not  likely  that,  even  under  its  present  very  able 
management,  the  Figaro  will  ever  regain  its  former 
position  ;  people  do  not  care  to  pay  three-halfpence  for  a 
paper  when  they  can  get  a  journal  of  the  same  size  and 
as  full  of  news  for  a  third  of  that  sum. 

All  the  leading  papers  in  Paris,  with  the  exception 
of  the  Figaro  and  the  Gaulois  and  one  or  two  other 
obscure  sheets,  are  now  published  at  the  popular  price. 
The  paper  also  owed  much  of  its  former  success  to  the 
popularity  of  individual  writers  who  used  to  contribute  to 


THE    -FIGARO"   PLEIAD  365 

it  exclusively — Albert  WolfiC  Adrien  Marx,  and  others  ; 
and  as  their  numbers  decreased  one  by  one,  and  it  was 
found  impossible  to  replace  them,  the  success  of  the 
paper  declined. 

From  a  newspaper  proprietor's  point  of  view  there  is 
a  great  deal  to  be  said  for  anonymity  of  articles.     It  is 
the  standing  rule  in  the  Petit  Journal,  the  Temps,  and 
some  other  papers,  where  none  but  the  occasional  con- 
tributors are  allowed  to  sign  their  work.     The  editor  of 
the.  Petit  Journal  \.o\d  me  that  the  rule  was  adopted  after 
the   proprietors    quarrelled    with     Leo    Lespes.      "  Leo 
Lespes,"    said    Monsieur    Escoffier,    "  was    engaged    to 
write    a    leading    article    daily.       He    used    to    sign    as 
*  Timothy  Trimm.'     It  was  a  kind  of  literary   totir  de 
force,  which  amused  and  interested  the  public.     People 
used  to  say  that  it  was  impossible  for  one  man  to  write 
an  article  every  day,  and  so   Lespes  used  to  write   his 
leaders  in  public  places,  in  cafds  and  restaurants,  where 
people    could    see    him    at    work.     The    interest   shown 
turned  his  head  :  he  fancied  that  he  was  indispensable 
to  the  paper,   that  without  him  the  Petit  Journal  could 
not  exist.      In  consequence,  his  pretensions  became  so 
exorbitant  that  the  proprietors  found  it  advisable  to  get 
rid  of  him.     Since  his  time  all  the  leading  articles  have 
been  signed   '  Thomas  Grimm,'  but  that  covers  a  great 
number  of  contributors," 

I  remember  that  on  that  occasion  Monsieur  Escoffier 
gave  me  some  interesting  details  about  the  financial  side 
of  the  journal.  He  said  that  the  paper  could  get  along 
very  well  without  the  huge  revenues  obtained  from  its 
advertisement  columns,  for  the  sales  produced  a  net 
daily  profit  of  ^1,400.  The  advertisements  brought  in 
a  similar  daily  revenue.  Since  those  days  the  Petit 
Parisien  has   largely  encroached  on    the   popularity  of 


366  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

the  Petit  lournal,  aiul  the  reason  allcocd  is  that  by 
printing  in  smaller  type  it  gives  more  matter  and  fuller 
local  news.  Both  papers  have  a  circulation  well  over  a 
million. 

Such  a  circulation  is,  however,  less  curious  than 
the  other  extreme.  I  refer  to  the  political  dailies,  whose 
printing  average  falls  well  below  five  hundred  copies  a 
day.  It  was  said  of  Charles  Laurent's  Le  Jour  ih-^i  it 
never  reached  a  total  sale  of  three  hundred  copies. 
Clemenceau's  La  Justice  had  a  very  small  sale.  The 
Siir/e,  under  the  editorship  of  Yves  Guyot,  had  no 
circulation  at  all  ;  it  was  not  even  to  be  found  at  the 
kiosques.  Yet  the  editors  of  these  papers  seemed  to 
thrive.  One  knows  that  the  Minister  of  the  Interior 
has  a  fund  from  which  he  subsidizes  journalists  who 
support  the  Government,  but  the  question  is  why  it 
should  be  thought  worth  while  to  subsidize  newspapers 
which  are  read,  if  read  at  all,  by  so  few  people.  In 
point  of  vitality  these  papers  are  only  one  degree  higher 
in  the  scale  than  the  many  papers  to  which,  though  they 
are  dead,  a  periodical  semblance  of  existence  is  given. 

There  is  a  publisher  in  Paris  who,  just  before  the  last 
number  of  any  paper  is  about  to  appear,  comes  forward 
with  the  offer  of  a  trifling  sum  for  the  copyright  of  the 
title.  This  man  keeps  alive,  as  far  as  is  requisite  for 
the  purposes  of  retaining  the  ownership  of  the  title,  all 
the  dead  newspapers  of  Paris.  In  the  obscurity  and 
silence  of  his  printing-house  there  is  given,  at  the 
rarest  intervals,  a  faint  semblance  of  existence  to 
papers  which  once  filled  Paris  with  the  clamour  of  their 
names.  Of  each  journal  the  fewest  possible  number  of 
copies  is  printed.  The  contents  are  the  same  in  one 
and  all.  Republican  and  Royalist,  Bonapartist  and 
Socialistic    papers    which    in    their    old   days   on    earth 


KEEPING    DEAD    PAPERS   ALIVE       ^6^ 

fought    each    other  tooth   and    nail  seem    reconciled    in 
the  peace  and  quiet  of  this  living  grave. 

To  this  limbo  departed  long  ago  that  famous 
champion  of  General  Boulanger's  cause,  La  Cocarde. 
No  paper  roared  more  lustily  in  the  streets  of  Paris 
than  this.  I  knew  its  editor  well,  Terrail-Mermeix. 
JHis  name  may  be  remembered  as  author  oi  Les  Coulisses 
dzt  Boulangisine.  I  had  long  been  interested  in  his 
career  before  I  got  to  know  him.  His  was  a  notable 
figure  on  the  boulevards.  He  used  to  dress  so  as  to 
resemble  Emile  de  Girardin.  He  started  by  being  a 
Legitimist  and  a  writer  on  Royalist  papers  ;  and  because 
the  Republican  journals  would  have  none  of  him  when 
his  convictions  changed,  he  went  over  to  Boulanger. 
He  told  me  that  Ranc  had  told  him  in  the  lobby  of 
the  Chamber  that  "  the  Republic  is  a  corner,"  and  that 
no  journalist  who  had  been  connected  with  Royalist 
papers  would  be  trusted  or  admitted  on  to  the  Republican 
press. 

Mermeix  was  charged  with  ingratitude  for  betraying 

the    secrets   of    Boulangism.      He    used    indignantly    to 

repudiate  the  charge.      He  declared  that  he  was  indebted 

in  no  way  to  the  General  or  to  his  party  ;  that  for  the 

very  expenses  of  his  election  he  had  had  to  indebt  himself 

to  the  extent  of  eleven  thousand  francs ;  that  the  publishing 

of  the  articles  was  not  a  literary  speculation,  inasmuch  as 

he  had  sold  the  whole  series  to  the  Fimro  for  the  trifline 

sum  of  ^80.      He  professed  that  his  motive  had  been  to 

do  an   act   of  justice.      He  described   the  General  as  a 

traitor,  and  gave  me  particulars  of  a  conversation  which 

he  had  overheard  at  the  house  of  the  Duchess  d'Uzes, 

I  and  which,  he  said,  first  opened  his  eyes  to  the  fact  that 

I  the    Boulangist    movement    was    a   gigantic    conspiracy 

I  against    the    Republic.      His    action    was   not    approved 


o 


68  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 


of  ill  Paris,  and  after  the  publication  of  Lcs  Coulisses 
he  disappeared  from  the  ranks  of  Parisian  journalists.  I 
used  to  meet  him  occasionally  afterwards,  and  he  told 
me  that  he  held  some  post  under  Government,  which 
often  took   iiiin   abroad. 

I  was  with  him  on  the  night  when  he  was  elected  a 
member  of  Parliament,  and  saw  the  tears  in  his  eyes. 
Atter  that  he  used  often  to  show  me  his  deputy's  silver 
medal,  and  say  that  it  was  what  he  was  proudest  of  in  the 
world.  In  those  days  he  used  to  say  that  his  highest 
ambition  would  be  realized  if  he  could  reach  the  post  of 
Prefect  of  Police.  His  adversaries  afterwards  said  that 
he  had  qualifications.  It  is  quite  possible  that  some  day 
his  ambitions  may  be  realized.  Even  stranger  things 
have  come  to  pass  in  the  French  political  vv^orld. 

Another  Royalist  editor  whom  I  knew,  who  did  not 
change  his  convictions,  and  who  lived  and  died  faithful  to 
his  cause,  was  Henri  de  Pene,  one  of  the  most  refined 
gentlemen  that  I  have  ever  met  in  Parisian  society.  He 
enjoyed  the  profound  respect  of  journalists  of  every 
party.  At  the  time  of  his  death  he  was  editor  of  the 
Gaiilois.  He  died  in  1888,  after  a  career  of  forty  years. 
He  was  the  "  Nemo  "  of  the  Figaro  in  its  early  days. 
In  1858  he  attracted  universal  notice  to  himself  by  a 
duel  which  at  the  time  created  a  great  sensation.  Having 
put  his  antagonist  hors  de  combat,  he  was  insulted  by  one 
of  the  latter's  seconds,  and  then  and  there  fought  a  second 
duel,  in  which  the  tide  of  fortune  turned  against  him  and 
in  which  he  was  very  seriously  wounded.  He  was  the 
author  of  some  novels  and  of  a  history  of  Henri  V.  I 
used  to  see  him  at  the  office  of  his  paper,  the  Clairon, 
which  he  edited  simultaneously  with  the  Gaulois.  It 
was  a  Royalist  paper  and  a  failure. 

I  n  my  early  days  in  Paris  there  were  many  personalities 


NEWSPAPERS   AND   MEN  369 

amongst  the  Parisian  pressmen.  To-day,  with  the  ex- 
ception of  Rochefort  and  Drumont,  they  have  all 
disappeared,  and  even  Drumont  is  a  newcomer,  whom 
I  can  remember  very  far  from  prosperous.  In  those 
days  each  paper  was  some  one  man.  The  Rappel  was 
Vacquerie,  the  Autorit^  was  Paul  de  Cassagnac,  the 
RSpubliqiLe  Frangaise  was  Reinach,  just  as  the  In- 
transigeant  is  Rochefort.  At  present,  excepting  the 
Intransigeant  and  the  Libre  Parole^  one  associates  no 
papers  in  France  with  single  individuals.  This  may 
arise  from  the  prudence  of  the  capitalist,  but  I  attribute 
it  rather  to  the  fact  that  for  the  journalists  of  this  genera- 
tion in  France  there  has  been  no  such  training  as  moulded 
the  great  men  who  were  at  the  head  of  the  profession 
when  I  first  came  to  Paris.  There  is  no  better  professor 
of  journalism  in  the  world  than  a  press  censor.  All  the 
fine  writers  to  whom  I  refer  had  been  brought  up  in 
their  profession  under  the  Empire  when  the  censorship 
of  the  press  was  rigorously  carried  out.  There  was  no 
hurried  writing  in  those  days.  Men  had  to  think  ;  they 
had  to  turn  their  pens  seven  times  in  their  hands  before 
writing  down  an  opinion,  and,  whilst  seeking  so  to 
convey  their  meaning  that  they  could  say  all  they 
wished  to  say  and  yet  keep  clear  of  Ste.  Pelagie,  they 
cultivated  style.  Nowadays,  when  a  man  may  say  any- 
thing he  writes  hurriedly,  with  a  typewriting  machine  as 
often  as  not. 

I  have  spoken  of  my  acquaintance  with  Vacquerie, 
whom  I  used  to  meet  at  Victor  Hugo's  house.  He  was 
a  dear  old  gentleman,  the  mildest  Revolutionary  whom  I 
have  ever  seen.  I  must  say,  though,  that  I  have  never 
yet  met  a  professional  Revolutionary  who  was  not  the 
mildest  of  men  in  his  private  capacity.  Opposition 
seemed  to  have  paid  well  in  Vacquerie's  case,  for  when 

24 


.v 


TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 


he  died  he  was  a  very  rich  man.  He  had  begun  life  in 
the  cottage  of  a  fisherman  in  Brittany.  I  sometimes 
used  to  visit  him  in  his  house,  a  splendid  mansion  in 
Passy,  which  was  filled  with  priceless  art  treasures.  I 
will  not  say  that  I  felt  any  resentment  against  Vacqueric 
for  living  in  such  style  while  preaching  the  equality  of 
men  and  the  infamy  of  capitalists,  for  he  was  a  kind  and 
benevolent  old  man;  but  it  certainly  did  open  my  eyes 
to  the  farce  of  professional  Socialism. 

I  have  always  had  great  admiration  for  Rochefort, 
and  it  is  a  sorrow  to  me  that  his  character,  owing  to  con- 
stant malicious  representations,  is  entirely  misunderstood 
in  England.  He  is  the  most  lovable  of  men.  I  know 
few  men  who  have  kinder  hearts.  Nobody  should  judge 
him  until  he  has  read  his  memoirs  of  his  life.  And 
there  he  does  not  give  one  by  any  means  a  full  concep- 
tion of  his  kindness  to  all  who  are  poor  or  weak  or 
unfortunate.  His  charity  is  boundless.  While  he  was 
living  in  England  one  of  the  servant-girls  in  his  employ- 
ment eot  into  trouble.  The  time  came  when  she  had  to 
confess  her  condition  to  her  master.  It  was  wuth  fear 
and  trembling  that  she  did  so,  for  she  knew  how  in 
England  such  things  are  regarded  by  Christian  employers. 
She  expected  to  be  flung  into  the  street,  with  the 
Thames  or  the  workhouse  or  Newgate  as  her  destina- 
tion. Rochefort  merely  asked  who  was  the  father  of  the 
child,  and  when  he  heard  that  it  was  one  of  his  own  men- 
servants  he  sent  for  the  man  and  talked  him  into  marrying 
the  girl  at  once.  He  paid  for  the  wedding,  and  kept  the 
married  couple  in  his  employment.  Some  time  later  he 
adopted  a  little  English  girl  whose  father  had  been 
hanged,  and  who  was  an  outcast  waif  in  London.  It  is 
to  Rochefort  that  every  Socialist  who  is  in  straits  applies 
for  money.     In  his  private  life  he  is  the  most  sober  and 


HENRI    ROCHEFORT,    SOCIALIST      371 

abstemious  of  men.  I  have  heard  him  represented  in 
England  as  a  debauchee,  a  man  of  riotous  living.  There 
is  no  man  less  so.  His  extraordinary  brilliancy  of  intel- 
lect needs  no  demonstration.  His  articles  in  the 
Intransigeant  are  as  clever  and  amusing  as  ever  they 
were  when  thirty-five  years  ago  he  was  battering  down 
the  throne  of  the  third  Napoleon.  He  is  violently 
attacked  in  Paris,  by  none  more  so  than  by  Socialists 
who  belong  to  a  different  group  than  his.  These  delight 
in  writing  of  him  as  "  le  Marquis."  The  fact  is  that  he 
has  the  nature  and  the  feelings  of  the  gentleman.  There 
can  be  no  doubt  whatever  of  the  sincerity  of  his  Socialism, 
and  this  is  what  enrages  the  pseudo-humanitarians  who 
attack  him.  Yet  I  am  sure  that  there  is  no  man  in  Paris 
who  wishes  any  ill  to  befall  him  and  who  would  not 
mourn  his  loss.  One  does  not  like  to  think  of  Paris 
without  our  Rochefort. 

A  man  we  still  miss  in  Paris  is  Aurelien  Scholl.  We 
shall  never  see  his  like  again.  He  belonged  to  the  old 
school  of  chroniqueurs,  whose  occupation  has  quite  gone, 
as  Parisian  newspapers  are  to-day.  He  was  one  of  the 
wittiest  of  men.  I  used  to  see  him  often  for  some  years 
before  his  death,  and  during  Zola's  first  visit  to  London 
I  was  much  in  his  company.  Like  Magnard  and  Fernand 
Xau,  he  felt  in  London  that  he  had  only  been  brought 
over  to  swell  Zola's  triumph,  and  speedily  returned  to 
Paris.  I  remember  taking  him  one  clay  from  the  Savoy 
Hotel  to  look  at  Newgate.  I  shall  never  forget  Scholl's 
look,  as  through  his  single  eyeglass  he  examined  the 
fetters  which  used  to  hang  over  the  entrance  to  the 
prison.  The  antithesis  between  the  man  and  the  build- 
ing was  as  strong  in  its  way  as  that  described  by  Hugo 
in  his  Quatre-  Vingt-Treize.  It  was  the  rapier  wondering 
at  the  steam-hammer.     It  was  Gavroche  cocking  his  eye 


372  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

at  the  Bastille,  h  was  the  wit  and  tolerance  of  the 
Parisian  boulevardier,  the  kindliness  which  a  knowledge 
of  the  world  brings  with  it,  aghast  at  the  spectacle  of  that 
monument  to  dull,  unreasoning  cruelty.  I  told  him  of  the 
things  which  still  went  on  within  those  gloomy  walls  ; 
I  showed  him  where  in  old  days  the  gallows  used  to 
stand,  and  pointed  to  the  door  through  which,  at  the 
beginning  of  the  century,  some  years  after  the  French 
Revolution,  Phcebe  Harris  was  brought  out  to  be  burned 
alive  at  the  stake  for  passing  a  spurious  two  shilling- 
piece.  "  B-r-r-r  !  "  he  exclaimed.  "  Let  us  get  away 
from  here,"  and  hurried  off  ejaculating  sounds  of  horror 
and  disgust.  He  did  not  quite  recover  until  we  had 
reached  Ludgate  Hill. 

Here,  as  we  turned  our  faces  west,  he  asked 
me  if  I  knew  the  story  of  the  benevolent  Israelite 
and  the  poor  woman  who  could  not  afford  to  get  her 
child  christened.  "  It  was  outside  a  Catholic  Church  in 
Warsaw,"  he  continued.  "  The  wealthy  Israelite  was 
passing  by  when  he  saw  a  poor  woman  who  was  holding 
a  child  in  her  arms,  and  who  was  weeping  bitterly. 
'  My  poor  woman,'  he  said,  'what  is  it  that  ails  you?' 
The  woman  said,  '  I  wanted  to  have  this  child  baptized, 
and  I  brought  it  to  the  church  ;  but  the  priest  says  that 
he  will  not  christen  it  unless  I  pay  him  a  rouble.'  '  Ah  ! 
I  see  ;  and  you  have  no  money  ? '  '  That  is  so,'  said 
the  woman,  and  began  to  cry  again.  '  Well,'  said  the 
benevolent  stranger,  '  I  do  not  hold  myself  with  christen- 
ings and  such-like,  but  I  don't  care  to  see  a  poor  woman 
crying  for  the  want  of  such  a  trifle  as  a  rouble  or  two, 
and  for  once  I  don't  mind  going  against  my  convictions. 
Here,  good  woman,  I  find  I  have  no  small  notes,  so  take 
this  twenty-rouble  note,  get  your  child  christened,  and 
bring  me  back  the  change.     I  will  wait  for  you  round 


THE    BENEVOLENT   FINANCIER       373 

yonder  corner.'  Some  time  later  the  woman  returned, 
radiant,  and  handed  him  the  change  of  the 
twenty-rouble  note.  '  Now,'  he  said,  '  we  are  all  happy 
and  contented  :  you,  because  your  child  has  been  bap- 
tized ;  the  priest,  because  he  has  earned  a  rouble  ;  and 
I,  because  I  am  nineteen  roubles  to  the  good,  as  the 
twenty-rouble  note  was  a  forgery.'  "  Scholl  added  that 
most  of  the  stories  about  Jewish  sharpness  are  invented 
by  the  Jews  themselves.  I  hardly  believed  him  at  the 
time  ;  but  some  time  later,  in  connection  with  a  Purim 
competition  started  by  a  Jewish  paper  in  London,  where 
a  prize  was  offered  for  the  best  specimen  of  Jewish 
humour,  I  noticed  it  was  to  a  story  of  similar  roguery 
that  the  competitors  were  referred  to  as  the  model  of 
the  stories  wanted. 

On  our  way  back  to  the  Savoy  we  went  into  the 
Gaiety  bar,  and  as  we  sat  at  one  of  the  tables  there 
Scholl  talked  of  a  recent  duel  in  Paris.  He  was  the 
great  Parisian  authority  on  the  point  dhonneur,  and  to 
him  used  to  be  submitted  for  arbitration  any  knotty  point 
which  might  arise  between  seconds  in  arranging  the 
conditions  of  an  encounter.  He  was  a  very  determined 
advocate  of  duelling,  and  used  to  say  that  it  was  the 
easiest  and  best  way  of  settling  certain  disputes.  I  have 
always  held  that  there  is  much  to  be  said  in  favour  of 
duelling.  The  mere  fact  that  the  possibility  of  having  to 
fight  a  duel  some  day  obliges  every  young  Frenchman  to 
learn  and  practise  fencing,  than  which  no  better  exercise 
for  the  eye,  the  wrist,  the  muscles  and  the  nerves,  can  be 
imagined,  is  a  decided  point  in  its  favour.  In  England 
duelling  as  practised  in  France  is  habitually  derided. 
A  reproach  is  made  against  duellists  that  their  encounters 
do  not  often  end  fatally.  It  is  rarely  desired  that  they 
should  do  so.     For  the  rest,  in  civilian  circles  in  England 


vW 


4  TWEXrV    VI- ARS    1\    PARIS 


the  spirit  of  cliiv.ilry  is  vi-ry  wt'iik.  Is  ihcrc  any  other 
country  in  the  world  where  a  husband  accepts  as  a  solatium 
for  his  outraged  honour  the  daniai^es  in  money  awarded 
by  a  divorce  court  ?  I  have  often  wondered  what  the 
man  does  with  the  money  so  acquired,  and  under  what 
heading  he  enters  it  on  the  credit  side  of  his  banking 
account. 

But  it  was  on  re-reading  Stevenson's  Kidnapped  the 
other  d.iy  that  I  was  particularly  impressed  with  the 
extent  to  which  the  spirit  of  chivalry  has  been  swamped 
in  England  by  commercialism.  Stevenson  depicts  for  us 
in  Alan  Stuart  Breck  an  ideal  type  of  the  chivalrous 
soldier,  whose  pride  and  self-esteem  were  almost  morbid 
in  degree,  whose  soul  was  the  soul  of  honour.  Yet,  as 
far  as  I  can  remember,  not  a  single  protest  was  raised  by 
the  readers  of  this  book  when  the  author  involved  this 
Alan  Breck  in  a  dirty  eavesdropping  transaction  which 
would  have  disgraced  the  least  scrupulous  of  private 
detectives.  I  refer  to  where  Alan  Breck  cheerfully  and 
without  a  moment's  hesitation  consents  to  entrap  David 
Balfour's  old  uncle  into  the  confession  of  his  misdeeds, 
whilst  the  hero  of  the  story,  his  lawyer  and  the  lawyer's 
clerk,  are  waiting  in  ambush  to  overhear  the  confession. 
I  protest  that  Alan,  as  he  had  been  described  to  us, 
would  have  stooped  to  no  such  complacencies.  At  the 
suggestion  that  he,  an  officer  and  a  gentleman,  should 
lend  himself  to  such  work,  he  would  have  laid  the  flat 
of  his  sword  over  the  shoulders  of  that  very  impudent 
lawyer. 

I  remember  meeting  Scholl  with  Zola  and  others  of 
the  Parisian  party  in  London  at  the  Cafe  Royal  just  after 
they  had  returned  from  the  Guildhall,  where  they  had 
met  the  provincial  mayors.  Zola  was  much  impressed 
with  the  robes  and  metal  adornments  of  the  civic  fathers. 


Pkolo  by  permission  of"  La  France  Contemporaine,"  Paris. 

MADAME  ADAM 
(Juliette  Lamber). 


AURELIEN  SCROLL  AND  THE  WHISTLE  375 

but  what  had  most  struck  Scholl  was  the  efficacy  of  the 
whistles  used  for  calling  up  the  carriages  by  the  porters. 
He  asked  me  to  procure  him  such  a  whistle,  which  he 
said  would  amaze  the  Parisian  chasseurs. 

He  was  so  singularly  shortsighted  that  one  wonders 
how  he  managed  ever  to  come  unscathed  out  of  any  of 
the  many  duels  in  which  he  engaged.  Apropos  of 
his  sight,  he  was  one  day  complaining  that  his  eyeglass 
was  practically  of  no  use  to  him.  "  Why  don't  you  take 
the  next  number  at  the  optician's,"  he  was  asked.  "  The 
next  number,"  he  retorted,  "  is  a  poodle."  I  should 
explain  that  in  Paris  poodles  are  most  generally  used  for 
leadings  the  blind.  His  was  a  familiar  figrure  on  the 
boulevards,  and  one  misses  it  sadly.  I  rarely  saw  him 
when  he  was  unaccompanied,  and  usually  his  companion 
was  some  pretty  woman.  The  prettiest  women  in 
Paris  seemed  proud  to  take  his  arm.  He  died  at 
Etampes,  so  changed  as  to  be  unrecognisable.  He  had 
a  great  fondness  for  that  country  town.  He  said  that  it 
was  the  nearest  spot  to  Paris  where  in  the  spring  one 
could  hear  the  cuckoo  call,  and  added  that,  out  of  con- 
sideration for  the  married  men  of  the  capital,  that 
thoughtful  bird  came  no  closer  to  town. 

I  have  to  thank  Madame  Juliette  Adam  for  many 
acts  of  kindness  and  hospitality  during  my  life  in  Paris. 
At  one  time  I  used  to  attend  her  receptions  in  the  Rue 
Juliette  Lamber  with  some  regularity,  and  at  the  period 
when  she  was  thinking  of  writing  her  memoirs,  I 
endeavoured  to  arrange  for  their  publication  in  England. 
That  has  been  done  since  with  more  success.  Like 
most  people  who  have  great  talents,  she  is  simple,  kindly, 
and  unaffected.  She  once  did  me  the  kindness  of  review- 
ing at  great  length  one  of  my  books  on  social  questions 
in  England.      It  should  not  be  forgotten  of  her  that  she 


376  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

was    the    literary    yrodmothcr    of   Pierre    Loti    and    Paul 
Bcnirsret. 

It  was  at  her  house  that  Jeanne  Hugo,  then  the  wife 
o\  Leon  Dautlet,  pointed  out  to  me  another  Parisian 
lady,  remarkable  in  a  very  different  way.  Jeanne  touched 
my  arm  and  asked  me  to  look  at  a  fat,  little,  old  gentle- 
man in  evening  clothes  who  was  standing  close  to  us. 
"  What  a  strange-looking  little  man!"  I  whispered.  "  It 
isn't  a  man  at  all,"  said  Madame  L(^on  Daudet ;  "it's 
Madame   Dieulafoy,  the  traveller  and  writer." 


CHAPTER  XXII 

The  Quartier  Latin— A  Hopeless  Mode  of  Existence — Victor  Considerant — • 
Jean  Moreas — His  Duel  with  Darzens — The  Poet  and  the  Washer- 
woman— The  Fate  of  Maurice  Rollinat — Rene  Leclerc — Verlaine  and 
Bibi-la-Puree  —  Laurent  Tailhade  —  A  Successful  Phrase  —  Marcel 
Schwob  and  Hugues  Rebell — Stephane  Mallarme — A  Matrimonial 
Proposal — W.  T.  Peters — Stuart  Merrill— Raoul  Ponchon — Those  who 
have  Resisted — Paul  Adam — Henri  de  Regnier — Maurice  Barres — 
Pierre  Louys — The  Writing  of  "  Aphrodite " — The  Regret  of  an 
Academician. 

FROM  the  Greater  Bohemia  let  me  pass  reluctantly 
to  Bohemia  the  Less.  Reluctantly,  for  here 
indeed  to  remember  is  to  mourn.  How  fully  do  I  now 
appreciate,  as  I  conjure  up  before  my  eyes  my  memories 
of  that  Bohemian  land,  the  Latin  Quarter,  the  horror 
with  which  Alphonse  Daudet  used  to  speak  of  the 
destructive  life  that  is  led  there  !  I  have  watched  this 
Latin  Quarter  life  for  twenty  years,  and  of  the  men  whom 
I  came  to  know  there,  none  but  the  very  fewest  have 
escaped  what  is  the  logical  conclusion  of  an  existence  in 
which  every  rule  of  physical  and  mental  hygiene  is 
violated.  In  the  course  of  those  twenty  years  I  have 
witnessed  the  ruin  in  body  and  soul  of  more  men  than  I 
care  to  think  of  As  to  the  poor  women,  pale  and 
gracious  phantoms  which  flit  before  my  eyes  as  I  look  back 
upon  all  those  years,  it  is  in  the  social  order  of  things  that 
one  inquire  not  too  closely  into  what  their  fates  may  have 
been.     They   come,    they   smile,    they   go,    and   at  the 

377 


378  TWHN  TV    \'1':.\RS    IN    PARIS 

lower  end  of  the  broad  highway  of  the   Bohemian  land 
the  hospitable   Seine  flows  on. 

The  men  to  whom  1  refer  as  having  been  destroyed 
by  this  existence  are  such  as  tried  to  imitate  the  heroes 
of  Murger's  poisonous  book  (as  Daudet  used  to  call  it)  to 
combine  an  artistic  career  with  the  low  debauchery  to 
which  at  every  step  modern  Bohemia  panders.  The 
words  "The  Latin  Quarter  life"  are  in  this  sense 
generic,  and  equally  well  describe  the  hopeless  mode  of 
existence  which  is  led  in  other  parts  of  Paris  also.  It  is 
a  wilful  shutting  of  the  eyes  to  the  physiological  fact  that 
no  life  is  more  exacting  or  more  jealous  than  the  artistic 
life,  be  the  man's  pursuit  that  of  letters,  or  of  music, 
painting,  or  the  other  arts  ;  and  that  to  endeavour  to  tax 
the  brain  chronically,  while  debilitating  the  body  by 
every  calculated  and  scientific  means,  is  to  court  inevitable 
disaster.  Since  the  days  pourtrayed  in  la  Vie  de  Boheme, 
the  Latin  Quarter  has  become  more  and  more  a  place  of 
danger  for  the  young.  In  Murger's  time  wine  usually, 
and  punch  on  opulent  and  therefore  rare  occasions,  used  to 
be  drunk  there.  Who  shall  enumerate  the  list  of  alcoholic 
poisons  which  to-day  have  been  substituted  for  sake 
of  greater  gains  by  rapacious  purveyors  ?  At  the  "  green 
hour  "  one  may  see  mere  boys  in  any  Latin  Quarter  cafd 
drinking  absinthe — to  mention  this  alone — with  all  the 
familiarity  and  conviction  of  old  soldiers  of  the  army  of 
Africa.  And  of  absinthe  there  is  only  this  to  be  said, 
that  it  is  composed  of  fourteen  distinct  poisons,  and  that 
its  chronic  use  invariably  leads  to  paralysis  in  one 
dreadful  form  or  another.  As  to  the  other  temptations 
which  here  make  for  perdition,  the  other  dangers 
which  encompass  the  imprudent,  the  same  degeneration 
may  be  observed.  The  grisette  of  Murger's  days  is  by 
no  means  dead,  as  it  pleases  so  many  superficial  students 


THE    OUARTIER    LATIN    LIFE         379 

of  Parisian  social  life  to  say  ;  but  habits  of  intemperance 
are  fatal  to  domestic  life  even  in  morganatic  alliances. 

When  I  first  came  to  Paris  there  were  still  to  be 
found  men  in  the  Latin  Quarter  to  meet  whom  it  was 
worth  one's  while  to  cross  the  bridges.  It  was  there  that 
I  made  the  acquaintance  of  Victor  Considerant,  then  a 
very  old  man,  who  was  one  of  the  few  sincere  Socialists 
whom  I  have  ever  met.  Considerant  was  a  disciple  of 
Fourier,  a  member  of  the  phalansterian  school,  and  one 
of  the  founders  of  the  Fourierist  colony  in  America. 
He  had  sacrificed  to  his  principles  a  large  personal 
fortune.  When  I  met  this  splendid  old  man  in  Paris  he 
was  living  in  proud  and  honoured  poverty  in  two  small 
rooms  in  the  Rue  Gay-Lussac.  His  convictions  were  as 
strong  in  him  as  ever.  His  deceptions,  the  successive 
desertions  of  his  comrades-in-arms,  the  disillusions  which 
ever  wait  upon  the  true  humanitarian,  had  in  no  degree 
dispelled  his  magnificent  confidence  in  Socialism  as  the 
road  to  perfect  human  happiness.  He  delighted  in 
having  young  men  about  him  to  whom  he  could  expound 
his  theories,  to  whom  he  could  communicate  his  warm 
enthusiasm.  He  was  too  poor  to  receive  his  friends  at 
his  lodgings,  but  we  used  to  meet  him  at  the  Cafe  de  la 
Sorbonne.  He  was  a  welcome  and  honoured  guest  there, 
though  he  never  asked  for  anything  beyond  a  glass  of 
water. 

At  the  Cafe  Vachette,  opposite,  I  first  made  the 
acquaintance  of  Jean  Moreas.  That  was  twenty  years 
ago.  When  I  desire  to  meet  him  to-day  it  is  still  there 
that  I  go  to  look  for  him.  He  is  one  of  the  men  who, 
delighting  in  the  freedom  of  the  Latin  Quarter  life,  has 
managed  to  steer  through  all  its  pitfalls.  But  he  has 
always  been  too  true  a  poet  to  succumb  to  the  ugly 
things  of  life.     Already  when  I  first  made  his  acquaintance 


380  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

he  was  spoken  of  amongst  les  jeimes  as  one  of  the 
master-poets  of  France.  To-day  official  recognition  of 
his  genius  has  been  awarded  to  him,  and  the  red  ribbon 
of  the  Legion  of  Honour  adorns  his  buttonhole.  He 
has  never  lived  for  anything  but  for  his  art.  In  former 
days  he  had,  I  believe,  against  adversity  and  the  opposi- 
tion of  his  family,  the  same  struggle  that  Wordsworth 
had.  He  lived  in  the  very  poorest  way,  entirely  absorbed 
in  his  verse.  In  those  days  he  was  a  confirmed  night- 
walker.  To  avoid  the  crowds  which  throng  the  streets 
by  day,  and  to  find  in  the  silence  and  the  inspiration  of 
the  night  the  atmosphere  which  is  wanting  in  towns  in 
the  day-time,  he  used  only  to  go  out  at  nights.  One 
might  meet  him  at  any  hour  after  dark,  mouthing  his 
verses  as  he  walked  along.  Many  of  his  beautiful 
poems  were  composed  in  this  way.  An  Athenian  by 
birth,  he  will  rank  high  In  French  literature. 

I  once  acted  as  second  to  Moreas  in  a  sword  duel, 
and  I  much  admired  the  pluck  with  which  he  fought. 
His  adversary  was  Rodolphe  Darzens,  who  has  since 
developed  into  a  prosperous  sporting  journalist  whose 
speciality  is  to  write  about  the  motor-boat.  Moreas  and 
he  had  several  encounters.  In  the  duel  in  which  I  acted, 
Darzens'  seconds  were  the  poet  Ephraim  Mikhael  and 
Jacques  Madeleine.  Mikhael  was  a  Jew,  a  poet  of  the 
rarest  distinction.  He  died  quite  young,  and  it  was 
the  universal  opinion  of  literary  France  that  a  great  loss 
to  literature  had  been  sustained.  He  had  a  face  of  that 
singular  beauty  which  Nature  often  bestows  on  those 
who  are  not  to  be  long  of  this  world  ;  and  I  remember 
that  I  was  more  often  looking  at  him  than  an  attentive 
second  should  have  done.  The  article  which  Catulle 
Mendds  wrote  about  him  after  his  death  was  one  of  the 
finest   pieces   of  prose   that   even    Mendes  ever  wrote. 


THE    POET,    EPHRAIM    MIKHAEL      381 

The  master  saluted  in  Mikhael  one  of  the  greatest  poets 
he  had  known.  It  was  not  friendship  which  dictated 
this  eulogy.  Mendes  is  the  severest  of  critics.  One 
still  remembers  how,  on  the  occasion  of  the  funeral  of  his 
son,  Raphael  Mendes,  the  father,  during  a  halt  in  the 
procession,  was  heard  to  say  to  those  around,  speaking  of 
the  dead  man,  "  Ah  !  he  was  a  very  bad  painter."  As 
to  Jacques  Madeleine,  he  has  since  taken  an  honourable 
place  amongst  French  writers.  As  to  the  gentleman  who 
acted  with  me  for  Moreas,  a  man  named  Tissandier,  I 
think  that  the  only  claim  to  notoriety  that  distinguished 
him  was  that  during  the  Boulangist  agitation  he  had 
owned  and  edited  a  paper  called  the  Sifflet,  with  each 
copy  of  which  was  presented  a  whistle  wherewith  to  hoot 
at  the  General  in  the  streets.  The  encounter  took  place 
at  the  Hermitage  at  Villebon,  and  resulted  in  the  defeat 
of  Darzens.  The  two  men  fought  with  surprising  energy 
for  over  an  hour.  It  was  a  stimulating  spectacle,  full  of 
interest. 

In  those  days  I  used  to  meet  also  another  poet  who 
enjoys  much  distinction  in  the  Parisian  Parnassus.  I 
feared  that  he  was  killing  himself  He  had  so  acquired 
the  absinthe  habit  that  he  used  to  take  the  poisonous 
stuff  in  everything  that  he  drank.  On  more  than  one 
occasion  I  had  to  assist  in  moving  him  home  after  he 
had  fallen  down  in  an  epileptic  fit,  which  is  one  of  the 
earlier  effects  of  excessive  absinthe  drinking.  Then,  one 
day,  he  declared  that  he  had  had  enough  of  that  life,  and 
retired  to  the  country.  We  heard  that  he  had  been 
forced  to  do  so  by  his  lady-love,  who  was  a  washer- 
woman of  great  beauty  and  much  strength  of  character. 
She  took  her  poet  to  a  place  many  miles  away  from 
Paris,  married  him,  and  made  him  settle  down  into  a 
peaceful  and  orderly  bourgeois.     It  was  indeed  reported 


3S2  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

that  lu-  had  become  a  municipal  councillor  in  his  little 
town.  His  literary  activity  rt^turned  to  him,  and  ever 
since  those  days  v^^e  have  had  in  his  work  the  proof  of 
the  advantages  of  the  simple  life. 

It  was  the  simple  life,  also,  which  saved  poor  Rollinat 
at  a  time  when  his  friends  were  despairing  of  him.  I 
met  Rollinat  in  1S83  for  the  first  time.  It  was  shortly 
after  he  had  published  a  terrible  volume  of  poems, 
which  seemed  to  have  been  inspired  by  Edgar  Allan 
Poe.  The  poet,  from  what  he  told  me,  seemed  to  be 
modelling  his  life  also  on  that  of  his  unhappy  master.  It 
was  drugs,  absinthe;  absinthe,  drugs.  In  the  very  nick 
of  time  he  fled  from  Paris.  In  the  country  he  recovered 
his  health  ;  his  genius  developed  ;  and  both  as  a  poet 
and  as  a  musician  he  did  splendid  work  for  years.  Of 
his  tragic  end  I  hardly  like  to  think.  I  hardly  like  to 
think  of  it,  because  when  I  do  think  of  it  inquietude 
assails  me.  There  were  three  of  us  together  in  a  room 
at  the  Hotel  Voltaire  on  the  last  occasion  before  he  left 
Paris,  when  I  was  in  Rollinat's  company,  and  of  those 
three  two  came  to  miserable  ends.  One  of  them  was 
the  poet  Oscar  Wilde ;  Maurice  Rollinat  was  the  other. 

Rollinat's  fate  was  the  most  horrible  that  one  can 
conceive — far  more  horrible  than  any  destiny  which  even 
he  had  ever  conceived  in  his  most  morbid  hours.  His 
wife,  to  whom  he  was  devotedly  attached,  was  bitten  by 
a  pet  dog  at  a  time  when  there  was  hydrophobia  in 
their  country  district.  She  did  not  wish  to  frighten  her 
husband,  and  so  told  him  nothing  about  the  accident, 
but  waited  for  an  opportunity  of  going  to  Paris  to  be 
attended  to  at  the  Pasteur  Institute.  It  was  some  time 
before  she  could  find  a  pretext  for  going  to  town,  and 
by  that  time  it  was  too  late.  Shortly  after  her  return 
home  from  Paris  she  was  attacked  by  the  horrible  disease, 


MAURICE    ROLLINAT'S    FATE  383 

and  died  in  the  cruel  torments  which  it  brings,  before  her 
husband's  eyes.  The  sudden  shock  of  this  catastrophe 
was  too  great  for  the  poor  fellow.  He  was  stricken 
down  with  paralysis,  and  after  lingering  for  some 
weeks,  a  living  corpse,  died  in  the  full  bloom  of  his 
genius. 

Compared  to  this  fate,  the  end  of  Ren^  Leclerc, 
better  known  in  French  literature  as  Rene  de  la  Villoyo, 
was  almost  a  merciful  one.  Leclerc  was  the  young 
poet  whom  I  first  met  at  the  table  dliote  in  the  Rue 
Champollion,  where  I  made  the  acquaintance  of  Joseph 
Aubert,  the  murderer.  In  those  days  he  was  studying 
medicine  with  a  view  to  becoming  an  army  surgeon  ; 
but  his  head  was  full  of  Murger's  nonsense,  and  his 
ambitions  were  to  attain  fame  as  a  poet  while  leading 
the  life  of  a  viveur  in  the  Latin  Quarter.  He  was  often 
in  the  company  of  Paul  Verlaine,  and  used  to  pledge 
the  master  in  long  draughts  of  absinthe.  His  parents 
more  than  once  tried  to  break  him  of  his  habits.  I 
remember  meeting  him  as  he  was  leaving  Paris  to  take 
up  the  editorship  of  a  provincial  paper  in  Savoy,  a  post 
which  his  father  had  procured  for  him. 

Some  years  later  he  told  me  with  tears  in  his  eyes 
that  he  was  forced  to  leave  the  qiiartier,  that  his  father 
had  cut  off  all  supplies,  and  that  he  had  the  choice 
between  starvation  and  accepting  another  post  which 
had  been  procured  for  him.  This  was  a  situation  as 
greffier  or  clerk  to  a  county  court  judge  in  some  small 
town  in  Brittany.  I  told  him  that  it  was  the  very  best 
thing  that  could  have  happened  to  him ;  that  in  the 
calm  and  repose  of  the  country  life  he  would  be  able  to 
do  good  work.  All  he  found  to  say  to  me  was  that  I 
had  become  an  atrocious  Philistine. 

I  heard  nothing  more  of  him  until  his  suicide  was 


384  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

the  talk  of  Paris.  In  almost  every  paper  there  appeared 
a  long  article  from  some  literary  celebrity,  eulogising  the 
dead  poet's  work  ;  comparing  him  to  Chatterton,  and 
reviling  his  poor  parents.  In  this  last  respect  these 
articles  were  most  cruel  and  unjust,  for  the  poor  old 
people  had  done  everything  that  parents  could  do  ;  and 
what,  as  it  afterwards  appeared,  was  the  direct  cause  of 
his  act  of  despair  was  that  his  father  had  refused  to 
advance  him  a  sum  of  nine  thousand  francs  with  which 
to  brinsf  out  an  edition  de  licxe  of  his  works.  He  killed 
himself  in  a  garret  in  the  Rue  Gay-Lussac  by  taking 
cyanide  of  potassium,  and  lay  a  corpse  for  some  days 
before  his  body  was  discovered  by  his  concierge.  After 
his  death  I  heard  that  he  had  been  starving  for  a  long 
time  previously.  A  friend  of  mine  told  me  that  about 
three  times  a  week  Leclerc  used  to  cross  the  river  to 
come  to  his  house  and  appeal  to  be  allowed  to  take 
lunch  with  him,  and  that  was  all  the  food  that  the  poor 
fellow  had  from  one  week's  end  to  the  other.  I  have 
wondered  why  he  never  came  to  me. 

I  am  sorry  that  I  ever  met  Paul  Verlaine,  for  the 
remembrance  of  the  devastation  which  had  been  wrought 
in  the  perishable  body  of  that  immortal  genius  must 
always  be  a  poignant  sorrow.  My  first  sight  of  this 
great,  simple,  beautiful  poet  and  child  was  in  the  base- 
ment of  a  cafd  on  the  Place  St.  Michel,  where  there  used 
to  be  singing,  and  where  the  poets  gathered.  Verlaine 
was  drunk  that  night,  and,  as  usual,  was  dressed  in  rags. 
He  had  a  false  nose  on  his  face  (for  it  was  carnival 
time),  and  he  was  piping  on  a  little  tin  whistle.  The 
spectacle  had  the  terrible  comedy  touch  of  Aristophanes. 
It  was  tragedy  made  grotesque.  The  man  had  the  head 
and  face  of  Socrates,  and  here  we  saw  Socrates  play- 
ing the  buffoon.     It  was  "the  glory  that  was  Greece" 


THE    DINNER   TO   VERLAINE         385 

swathed  in  the  mire  of  the  Paris  gutter.  I  could  not 
bear  the  sight,  and  hurried  home. 

The  next  occasion  on  which  I  saw  him  was  at  a 
dinner  given  in  his  honour  by  the  readers  of  the  literary 
paper,  La  Plume,  then  edited  by  the  late  Leon  Des- 
champs,  a  man  who  rendered  great  services  to  the  young 
litt(i7^ateurs  of  Paris.  Verlaine  was  childishly  delighted 
with  the  honour  shown  him.  Many  of  the  greatest 
writers  in  France  sat  down  to  that  mediocre  feast,  in 
proof  of  their  esteem.  Long,  however,  before  the  meal 
was  over,  Verlaine  had  sunk  into  a  state  of  morose 
apathy.  He  grimaced,  he  wrinkled  his  lofty  brows,  and 
screwed  up  his  eyes  ;  and  when  any  one  spoke  to  him 
he  pointed  a  finger.  But  he  said  nothing,  and  did  not 
recover  until,  when  the  dinner  was  over,  the  strong 
waters  were  placed  upon  the  table. 

The  circumstances  of  his  death  were  a  disgrace  to 
Paris.  He  died  in  utter  neglect  and  abandonment, 
amidst  the  most  sordid  surroundings.  There  were  with 
him  in  his  last  days  of  suffering  two  outcast  women  and 
one  outcast  man.  The  outcast  man  begged  for  him, 
stole  for  him.  Of  the  two  women,  as  he  used  to  say, 
one  robbed  him,  the  other  loved  him.  He  used  to  beat 
the  one  who  loved  him  as  long  as  he  had  the  strength 
to  do  so.  The  greatest  men  in  France  followed  his 
hearse  to  the  grave  ;  but  his  chiefest  mourner  was  Bibi- 
la-Puree,  the  outcast  man,  who  had  closed  his  wistful  and 
wondering  eyes. 

To  think  back  upon  those  twenty  years  of  observa- 
tion of  the  Latin  Quarter  is  to  evoke  little  but  tragic 
memories.  And  not  a  month  passes  almost  but  the 
papers  bring  to  the  quiet  of  my  retreat  news  of  the 
horrid  way  in  which  some  fresh  victim  has  fallen. 
Within    the    last    month    one    has    heard    the   dreadful 

25 


3S6  TWENTY    VF.ARS    1\    PARIS 

catastrophe  which  has  befallen  Laurent  Tailhade.'  I 
knew  him  well.  I  never  met  him  elsewhere  than  in 
the  Latin  Quarter.  To  him  belongs  the  honour  of 
having  pronounced  a  phrase  which  has  become  immortal 
in  France,  and  which  will  live  long  after  his  many 
writings  are  forgotten. 

It  may  be  remembered  that,  by  the  irony  of  fate, 
this  professing  anarchist,  whilst  dining  in  luxury  at 
Foyot's  Restaurant,  was  wounded — blinded,  indeed,  of 
one  eye — by  the  explosion  of  a  bomb  placed  on  the  sill 
of  one  of  the  windows  of  the  caf(f  by  an  anarchist  who 
did  not  profess,  but  who  acted.  It  was  after  he  had 
recovered  consciousness,  and  while  the  doctors  were 
bending  over  his  bleeding  and  mutilated  form,  that  Tail- 
hade  said  very  quietly,  "  What  does  the  deed  matter, 
provided  the  gesture  be  a  beautiful  one  ?  "  This  pourvu 
que  le  geste  soil  beati  appealed  to  the  French  mind  as 
no  other  famous  saying  ever  yet  appealed.  To  this 
heroic  epigram  were  at  once  accorded  its  grandes  entries 
into  the  palace  of  the  French  tongue. 

It  was  from  the  papers,  again,  that  early  in  this  summer 
I  read  of  the  early  death  of  two  other  writers  of  great  pro- 
mise. Marcel  Schwob  and  Hugues  Rebell.  With  Schwob 
at  one  time  I  had  had  some  intimacy  of  acquaintance.  I 
used  to  meet  him  at  Daudet's  house,  and  he  was  a  friend 
of  Oscar  Wilde's  before  the  latter's  misfortunes.  It  was 
Marcel  Schwob  who  revised  the  French  oi  Salom^.  He 
had  a  fine  knowledge  of  English  ;  he  translated  Moll 
Flanders,  and  the  Francesca  da  Rimini  of  Marion  Craw- 
ford. It  was  he  who  first  introduced  Robert  Louis 
Stevenson's  works  to  the  French  public.  I  remember 
the  exultation  with  which  he  discovered  in  The  Master 
of  Ballantrae  a  slip  made  by  its  author.  It  was  where 
^  From  which,  since,  he  has  made  good  recovery. 


A   SLIP   OF   STEVENSON'S  387 

Stevenson  describes  a  duel  by  night  in  midwinter,  and 
relates  how,  after  the  encounter,  one  of  the  combatants 
runs  his  sword  up  to  the  hilt  into  the  frozen  ground. 
Schwob,  though  he  was  no  swordsman,  pointed  out  that 
it  would  be  impossible  to  ram  a  sword  to  any  distance 
into  the  frozen  earth,  and,  very  proud  of  his  discovery, 
wrote  to  Stevenson  to  draw  his  attention  to  the  error. 

He  never  showed  us  Stevenson's  reply,  though  as  to 
many  other  letters  which  he  had  received  from  him  he 
was  always  proud  to  display  them.  He  had  been  the 
friend  and  disciple  of  Stephane  Mallarme,  and  in  his 
preface  to  his  famous  book  Le  Rot  ate  Masque  d'Or 
traces  the  history  of  that  symbolism  of  language  of  which 
Mallarme  was  the  protagonist  and  Euphues. 

It  was  at  the  house  of  Stephane  Mallarme  that  I  first 
heard  of  Hugues  Rebell.  It  was  by  this  name  that  the 
young  Breton  gentleman,  George  Grassal,  had  elected 
to  be  known  in  French  literature.  Before  his  death  he 
had  invested  his  pseudonym  with  no  small  public  esteem. 
In  those  days  Mallarme  used  to  hold  once  a  week  a 
reception  for  his  young  literary  friends  in  his  small 
apartment  in  the  Rue  de  Rome.  One  drank  mild  rum 
punch,  and  one  listened  to  the  master  as  he  discoursed 
on  art  and  literature.  His  discourses  were  couched  in 
the  symbolistic  language,  and  I  confess  that  I  found  it 
most  hard  to  understand  his  meaning.  At  such  times 
I  used  to  divert  myself  by  looking  over  his  wonderful 
translation  of  Poe's  Raven,  which  had  been  produced  in 
a  beautiful  illustrated  edition. 

One  night  we  separated  very  late.  Some  days  after- 
wards we  heard  that  that  night,  after  our  departure, 
Mallarme,  hearing  a  noise  in  his  little  kitchen,  had  gone 
in  there,  and  had  found  seated  on  an  overturned  orano-e- 
box  a  young  gentleman  dressed  in  fashionable  evening 


o 


SS  TWT.NTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 


clothes,  who  was  sucking  the  gold  knob  of  his  dress-stick 
and  who  seemed  in  a  state  of  much  ncTvous  trepidation. 
This  was  George  Grassal,  or  Hugues  Rebell.  It  appeared 
that  having  gone  by  mistake  into  the  kitchen  after  his 
admission  to  Mallarme's  flat,  he  had  not  been  able  to 
muster  up  the  courage  to  come  into  the  dining-room 
where  the  reception  was  being  held,  and  had  patiently 
sat  there  for  hours,  too  bashful  to  move.  He  was  one 
of  the  most  timid  men  I  have  ever  met.  In  appearance 
he  had  "  the  timidity  and  archness  of  aspect  of  a  very 
learned  Benedictine  monk."  His  eyes  were  at  once 
sparkling  and  humble.  He  bore  a  strong  resemblance 
to  Ernest   Renan. 

After  his  death  he  was  spoken  of  as  one  of  the  most 
delicate  stylists  of  contemporary  French  literature.  We 
became  friends  as  soon  as  we  had  met.  We  came  together 
very  often.  He  did  me  the  honour  to  admire  my  books, 
and  in  1895  published  in  that  important  review  the  Revue 
dc  Paris  a  long  essay  entitled  "  Un  Romancier  Anglais," 
in  which  my  career  was  described  and  my  books  were 
analysed.  This  essay  he  later  on  republished  in  a  book 
called  Trois  Artistes  Etrangers.  It  consecrated  my 
position  in  Paris,  and  if,  indeed,  as  it  is  said,  "posterity 
begins  at  the  frontier,"  I  had  reason  to  feel  grateful  to 
him.  On  my  side  I  was  able  to  introduce  him  to  many 
of  the  great  French  writers.  I  presented  him  to  Alex- 
andre Dumasy^/s-,  and  I  took  him  down  to  Champrosay, 
to  make  him  known  to  Alphonse  Daudet.  We  were 
excellent  friends,  and  the  only  act  for  which,  as  I  look 
back  on  our  long  intercourse,  I  have  to  reproach  his 
memory  is  that  when  disaster  came  upon  him  he  forgot  me. 

I  had  not  heard  of  him  for  some  months  before  his 
death,  but  I  understood  that  he  was  living  his  usual  life 
and  that  he  was  hard  at  work.      I  believe  that  one  of  his 


HUGUES    REBELL  389 

last  literary  labours  was  to  translate  a  small  part  of  Inten- 
tions into  French.  I  had  no  anxiety  on  account  of  not 
hearing  from  him.  I  believed  him  to  be  prosperous. 
I  had  always  known  him  as  a  young  man  with  a  large 
private  income,  who  used  to  dress  in  the  height  of 
fashion.  He  was  not  one  of  those  men  about  whom  his 
friends  had  any  call  to  be  anxious.  We  knew  him  to 
be  sybaritic  and  epicurean,  which  implied  that,  in  the 
common  parlance,   he  took  good  care  of  himself 

In  the  notices  which  appeared  in  the  papers  after  his 
death  there  was  nothing  to  suggest  the  horrible  end  that 
had  been  his.  Regret,  indeed,  was  universally  expressed 
for  the  loss  of  one  of  the  most  promising  novelists  and 
critics  of  the  day,  but  that  was  all.  Not  long  after  I 
had  read  this  announcement  I  met  on  the  Boulevard 
St.  Michel  a  mutual  friend,  a  leader-writer  on  the  Temps, 
who  gave  me  some  dreadful  particulars  about  Rebell's 
death,  and  sent  me  to  another  friend,  one  of  Rebell's 
publishers,  for  fuller  information.  I  then  learned  that, 
some  weeks  before  his  death,  entirely  ruined,  he  had 
been  forced  to  leave  his  beautiful  apartment  on  the 
Boulevard  des  Batignolles,  which  from  floor  to  ceiling 
in  every  room  was  upholstered  with  triple  rows  of  books, 
and  had  been  hiding  from  his  creditors  in  a  miserable 
lodging  in  the  Marais  Quarter.  Hither  he  had  been 
followed  by  a  vile  couple  of  Montmartre  outcasts,  who 
for  a  long  time  previous  to  his  ruin  had  entirely  sub- 
jugated the  unhappy  man.  It  was  the  story  of  Laurence 
Oliphant  over  again.  The  delicate  and  refined  artist  had 
sunk  to  be  the  submissive  slave  of  a  vulgar  bully  and  his 
paramour.  It  was  these  people  who  had  ruined  him.  It 
was  said  that  he  lived  in  mortal  terror  of  them  both,  that 
they  subjected  him  to  violence,  that  the  elegant  dandy 
and  erudite  scholar  had  become  their  ill-used  drudge. 


390  TWENTY   Yb:ARS    IN    PARIS 

His  inartyrdom  was  not  to  be  of  long  duration.  One 
day  while  wandering  forlornly  about  the  streets  he  fell 
down  in  a  fit.  and  was  removed  by  the  police  to  the 
accident  ward  of  the  Hotel  Dieu.  Here,  after  a  short 
illness,  lie  dietl.  His  taskmaster  had  discovered  his 
whereabouts,  and  after  Rebell's  death  concealed  the  fact, 
so  as  to  have  time  to  remove  the  few  bits  of  property, 
books,  and  so  forth,  which  the  unfortunate  young  man  had 
been  able  to  save  from  the  wreck  of  his  home.  His  death 
was  not  known  in  Paris  nor  by  his  family  until  ten  days 
after  it  had  occurred.  It  was  discovered  by  a  mere  acci- 
dent. One  of  his  publishers,  who  knew  something  about 
his  condition,  became  anxious  at  not  hearing  from  him, 
and  looked  up  the  Stat-civil  registers,  when  the  fact  that 
Hugues  Rebell  had  died  in  the  ward  of  a  hospital  was 
disclosed.  His  family  were  able  to  regain  possession 
of  the  body,  which  had  escaped  the  dissecting-rooms,  and 
carried  it  to  his  native  Brittany  for  interment. 

Mallarme,  who  in  his  lifetime  was  the  butt  of  the 
Philistines,  has  taken  a  high  place  in  French  literature. 
His  influence  on  the  young  writers  of  his  day  was 
enormous.  Many  men  now  in  the  front  ranks  speak 
of  the  dead  master  with  gratitude  and  affection.  For  my 
part,  being  a  foreigner,  I  was  not  well  able  to  understand 
his  language  or  to  profit  by  his  lessons.  I  remember, 
as  to  his  language,  that  once  having  asked  him  to  lunch 
with  Oscar  Wilde  and  Jean  Moreas  at  the  Cafe  Riche, 
he  sent  me  in  answer  a  pneumatic  letter-card.  I  was 
totally  unable  to  make  out  from  its  contents  whether  my 
invitation  had  been  accepted  or  refused,  and  it  was  not 
until  Mallarme  arrived  at  the  cafd  that  I  gathered  that  his 
involved  phrases  had  implied  an  acceptance. 

I  remember  asking  him  that  day  if  the  derivation 
of   his    name    was    not    from    the    two    words    mal  and 


Photo  by  Nadar,  Paris, 


STEPMANl':    MALLAKME. 


"THE    MAN    OF    EVIL   TEARS"        391 

armd.  Such  an  etymology  of  his  name  would  have  traced 
back  his  descent  to  warrior  and  chivalrous  days,  to  some 
ill-armed  knight  who,  in  despite  of  his  poor  accoutre- 
ments, had  perchance  performed  heroic  deeds.  I  think 
it  throws  some  light  on  his  complex  character  that  he 
repudiated  the  suggestion.  "  I  have  always  held,"  he 
said,  "that  my  name  derives  from  the  two  words  mal 
and  larind — "the  man  of  evil  tears."  A  little  "pre- 
ciosity "  such  as  is  instanced  in  this  remark  was  his  only 
failing.  He  was  a  very  kind-hearted  man  and  a  sincere 
artist.  Many  of  the  y^s^vAo-littdrateurs  who  attended 
his  receptions  used  to  take  cruel  advantage  of  his  good 
nature,  for  he  was  a  poor  man  with  no  income  beyond 
his  salary  as  teacher  of  English  in  one  of  the  public 
schools  of  Paris.  He  used  sometimes  to  express  anxiety 
as  to  the  future  of  his  only  daughter — needless  anxiety, 
as  the  event  proved,  for  after  his  death  a  large,  unex- 
pected inheritance  secured  her  independence. 

As  to  this  young  lady,  Mallarme  used  to  tell  an 
amusing  story.  One  winter's  morning,  very  early,  he 
was  aroused  out  of  bed  by  thundering  knocks  at  his  front 
door.  Having  admitted  his  visitor,  he  recognised  in  him 
a  young  provincial  poet  who  had  once  attended  one  of 
his  receptions,  but  whose  name  he  had  never  known. 
To  Mallarme,  shivering  in  his  nightgown,  the  hirsute 
young  man,  without  any  preamble,  made  the  following 
declaration  :  "  Maitre,  I  love  your  daughter,  and  I  have 
come  to  ask  you  for  her  hand."  Whilst  Mallarme,  much 
taken  aback,  was  stammering  out  that,  though  highly 
flattered,  the  hour  seemed  an  unusual  one  for  such  a  pro- 
posal, and  that  before  he  could  give  any  answer  he  would 
naturally  like  to.  .  .  .,  the  young  man  turned  on  his  heel, 
rushed  out  of  the  room  and  headlong  down  the  stairs. 
"  And  I  never  saw  him  again,"  said  Mallarme,  telling  me 


392  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

this  story,   '•  nor  did  1  ever  find  out  who  he  was  or  what 
was  his  name." 

I  think  that  I  may  say  that  apart  from  Jean  Moreas 
and  one  or  two  other  men,  all  the  writers  and  artists 
whose  acquaintance  I  first  made  in  the  Latin  Quarter, 
and  who  used  to  frequent  it,  have  come  to  disaster. 
Only  a  few  days  ago  I  heard  of  the  death  of  W.  T. 
Peters,  the  young  American  poet  who  used  to  be  the 
friend  of  Ernest  Dowson,  and  who  lived  his  life  in  that 
most  pernicious  atmosphere.  In  his  case  I  had  had 
forewarning  of  disaster,  for  as  some  months  ago  I  was 
wandering  along  the  quays,  turning  over  the  books  in 
the  boxes  of  the  secondhand  dealers  which  are  set  out 
upon  the  parapet  of  the  river,  I  had  come  across  several 
books  belonging  to  him,  some  bearing  inscriptions  from 
their  authors.  It  is  always  a  bad  sign  when  a  man  of 
letters  comes  to  sell  his  books,  and  I  fancied  that  the 
poor  pierrot,  whose  portrait  used  to  hang  in  the  drawing- 
room  in  Tite  Street,  must  have  fallen  upon  wintry 
days.  I  heard,  not  long  after,  of  his  death  from  Mon- 
sieur Jean  Joseph  Renaud,  the  swordsman  and  author. 
He  wrote  to  decline  an  invitation  to  my  country  retreat, 
and  said,  "  I  am  at  the  bedside  of  W.  Theodore  Peters, 
the  poet,  who  has  not  a  friend  in  the  world,  except 
myself,    my   wife  and  his  doctor,   and  who  is  dying." 

Another  American,  who  has  won  great  distinction 
as  a  poet  in  the  French  tongue,  Stuart  Merrill,  is  one 
of  the  men  who,  though  they  have  lived  all  their  lives 
in  the  Latin  Quarter,  have  avoided  its  dangers.  He 
was  one  of  the  few  men  who  remained  faithful  to  Oscar 
Wilde  after  his  downfall  ;  it  was  he  who,  while  Oscar 
Wilde  was  in  prison,  essayed  to  get  up  a  petition 
amongst  the  great  men  of  letters  in  Paris  for  his 
release. 


A    BACCHIC    POET  393 

Raoul  Ponchon,  who  has  lived  in  the  Latin  Quarter 
for  over  a  quarter  of  a  century,  and  whose  acquaintance 
was  one  of  the  earliest  which  I  made  there,  resists,  to 
the  joy  of  his  friends  and  the  delectation  of  his  admirers, 
all  the  attacks  which  have  felled  so  many  of  his  con- 
temporaries. But  he  is  a  man  of  Herculean  strength, 
full  of  the  vitality  of  one  of  the  heroes  of  that  Rabelais 
on  whom  he  claims  to  have  modelled  his  life  and  from 
whom  in  his  verse  he  draws  continual  inspiration.  He 
has  realized  what  Theodore  de  Banville  declared  to  be 
an  impossibility,  and  is  the  one  lyrical  poet  in  Paris 
who  earns  his  living  by  his  pen.  He  contributes  a 
"Gazette  Rimee "  to  iho^  Journal,  in  which  one  does 
not  know  which  more  to  admire,  the  excellence  of  the 
technique  of  the  versification,  or  the  jubilant  and  Bacchic 
humour  of  his  comments  on  the  passing  day.  He  has 
never  published  any  work  otherwise  than  in  this  fugitive 
manner,  but  for  as  long  as  I  have  known  him  it  has  been 
his  little  joke  to  announce  the  forthcoming  appearance 
of  his  collected  works. 

These  are,  however,  the  rare  exceptions.  The  men 
who  have  come  to  the  front  in  the  world  of  letters  and 
who  are  now  leading  the  delectable  life  of  reputed 
authors  and  comfortable  citizens,  men  like  Paul  Adam, 
Pierre  Louys,  Maurice  Barres,  and  Henri  de  Regnier 
are  men  who  deserted  the  quartier  altogether  at  a 
very  early  period,  or  whose  appearance  there  has  been 
of  the  rarest  occurrence.  Barres,  indeed,  I  never  met 
in  the  Latin  land.  He  has  from  the  very  first  conducted 
his  existence  on  an  elevated  plain,  treading  from 
adolescence  the  path  which  leads  through  mundane 
success  to  the  French  Academy.  He  has  been  a 
Boulangist  deputy,  a  Nationalist,  an  anti-Dreyfusite, 
but    never  aggressively,   nor    otherwise    than  as  a  man 


394  rWl'X'rV    VI-ARS    IN     PARIS 

of    the    world.      1    have    always    seen  him    well  dressed 
and  a  credit  to  his  coijjatr. 

Henri  de  Rei;nier,  ai4"<iin,  who  is  consitUred  another 
acadt'misahle  writer,  used  to  make  the  rarest  of 
appearances  in  the  quartier.  I  have  met  him  some- 
times at  the  dinners  of  "  La  Plume,"  but  I  do  not  think 
that  1  ever  saw  him  sitting  in  a  cafd  in  any  part  of 
Paris.  He  is  married  to  one  of  the  daughters  of  de 
Heredia,  the  Academician,  and  ranks  as  an  aristocrat 
of  letters. 

Paul  Adam,  who  has  come  to  high  honours  in  the 
Republic,  and  who  must  now  be  earning  as  large  an 
income  as  any  writer  in  France,  seemed  at  one  time 
to  have  been  caught  in  the  seductions  of  Bohemia  the 
Lesser.  I  can  remember  when  he  was  a  familiar 
figure  at  the  Cafe  Vachette.  A  novel  written  by  him 
in  collaboration  with  Jean  Moreas  is  still  extant,  in 
which  the  life  of  the  quartier  was  described  with  an 
accuracy  which  showed  long  and  close  observation. 
But  the  time  came  when  he  too  turned  his  back  on  the 
left  bank  of  the  Seine,  and  since  then  his  career  has 
been  upwards.  He  is  a  man  of  immense  productiveness; 
his  articles  in  the  Journal  are  never  less  than  three 
columns  in  length,  and  his  novels  are  each  but  single 
chapters  in  some  colossal  and  cyclic  work  of  fiction 
which  he  has  planned. 

It  was  indeed  in  a  caf^  of  the  Latin  Quarter  that 
I  first  met  Pierre  Louys,  but  this  was  only  during  a 
^owxMxA  fugue.  We  became  friends  at  once,  and  spent 
on  that  first  occasion  thirty-six  hours  in  each  other's 
company.  After  that  day  we  constantly  met.  He  was 
then  a  mere  lad  ;  yet  already  at  that  time  he  was  writing 
the  book  which  won  him  such  fame  in  Paris,  Aphrodite, 
and  I  remember  how  he  used   to   bring  me  pages  of  his 


A   PIOU-PIOU  OF   GENIUS  395 

strange  Gothic  manuscript,  and  read  me  passages  of  the 
story.  When  he  joined  the  army  as  a  conscript  and 
was  in  garrison  at  Abbeville,  we  used  to  correspond 
with  great  frequency,  and  he  never  came  to  Paris 
without  paying  me  a  visit  in  his  piou-pioits  uniform. 
After  his  release  from  the  service  we  went  together  to 
Amsterdam,  and  spent  long  hours  in  the  galleries 
there. 

The  publication  of  Aphrodite  was  one  of  the  biggest 
successes  that  Parisian  publishers  have  ever  experienced. 
It  appeared  first  in  feuilleton  form  in  the  Revue  Blanche, 
and  as  soon  as  the  publishers  of  this  magazine  announced 
that  it  was  to  appear  in  volume  form  also,  the  office  was 
inundated  with  orders  from  every  part  of  France.  More 
than  fourteen  thousand  copies  were  called  for  before  the 
book  had  been  issued.  The  booksellers  grumbled  at 
authors  who,  having  written  a  book  that  is  going  to  sell 
in  enormous  quantities,  do  not  arrange  to  be  able  to 
meet  an  enormous  demand  for  it.  Amongst  the  older 
men  of  letters  in  France  the  triumph  of  so  mere  a  lad 
aroused  even  bitterer  feelings.  An  Academician  was 
heard  to  say  at  a  soiree,  "  There  is  something  sad  in  the 
success  of  so  young  a  man."  The  book  realized  a 
fortune  and  now  ranks  as  a  classic. 

His  triumph  affected  Pierre  Louys  in  not  the 
slightest  degree.  The  acclaim  of  the  public  whether 
to  applaud  or  to  blame  will  never  affect  the  true  artist. 
His  "  Vos  Plaudite "  to  the  audience  who  have  wit- 
nessed his  labours  is  never  but  an  afterthought,  as  it 
was  with  the  actors  on  the  st;ige  in  Rome.  But  after 
the  publication  of  Aphrodite  I  saw  much  less  of 
him,  for  he  spent  many  months  of  every  year  in 
travelling  in  the  South.  It  was  a  point  with  him  to 
dislike  northern  countries,  and  though   he  formerly  used 


396  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

to  visit  London,  he  confined  his  later  journeys  to  regions 
south  of  Paris.  He  is  a  grandson  of  the  Doctor 
Louis  who  attended  the  unfortunate  Louis  XVI.,  and 
his  brother  is  Director  of  P^oreign  Affairs  and  one  of 
the  most  important  officials  of  the  French  Government. 
Pierre  Louys  is  now  married,  and,  like  his  brother-in- 
law,  Henri  de  Regnier,  is  on  the  high  road  to  the 
Academy.  I  am  glad  to  be  able  to  finish  this  story  of 
broken  lives  with  a  record  so  full  of  brightness  and 
endowed  with  prospects  so  hopeful. 


CHAPTER   XXIII 

Ernest  Dowson — And  the  Moralists— The  Catastrophe  of  his  Life— His 
Pursuit  of  Pain — Why  he  came  to  me  in  Paris — How  I  First  met 
him — The  Poet  and  the  Guardsman — His  Delight  in  Self-Abasement — 
The  Pathetic  Promptings  of  Instinct — How  I  found  him  in  London 
— He  comes  Home  with  me — The  Distress  of  Two  Poets — Ernest 
Dowson's  Last  Days — How  Relief  came  to  One  Poet — The  Coroner's 
Officer — "  No  Reasonable  Cause  " — His  Obsequies. 

IT  has  recently  pleased  certain  writers,  assuming  the 
tones  of  saddened  yet  reproachful  friendship,  to 
publish  about  that  delicate  soul  and  elect,  Ernest  Dowson, 
writings  which  go  to  class  him  among  the  self-destroying 
seekers  of  coarse  pleasures,  whose  pitiful  mode  of  life, 
with  its  logical  and  ineluctable  conclusion,  I  have 
depicted  in  the  pages  which  immediately  precede.  It 
was  the  act  of  gazetteers,  whose  eager  haste  to  print 
on  topics  of  actuality  allowed  of  no  time  to  consider 
what  things  were  better  left  unsaid.  Their  claim, 
moreover,  to  write  as  friends  of  the  dead  poet,  was  to 
arrogate  to  themselves  titles  to  which  they  never  held 
the  fee,  unless,  indeed,  in  this  degenerate  day,  the 
sacred  name  of  friend  appertains  to  him  also  who, 
when  a  man  of  genius  has  died  abandoned  and  forlorn, 
and  the  rare  mourners  are  returnincj-  from  his  humble 
obsequies,  emerges  from  the  penumbra  of  the  lych-gate, 
notebook  in  hand,  to  gather  such  details  about  his  agony 
and  death  as  shall  point  a  homily  on  the  pitfalls  of  the 
artistic  life. 

397 


598  TWHNTV   YEARS    IX    PARIS 

I  hold  that  no  man  can  sincerely  call  himself  the 
friend  of  one  who  is  dead  who  does  not,  when  writin^r 
ol  him,  most  diligently  ask  himself  whether,  if  his 
friend  could  read  the  things  which  he  puts  in  black 
or  white,  he  would  not  take  exception  to  any  single 
line.  In  the  essays  on  Ernest  Dovvson  to  which  I 
have  referred  I  find  dragged  into  the  light  and  laughter 
of  the  day  the  story  of  that  poor  courtship  of  his, 
on  which,  when  it  had  faded  into  the  regions  of  far- 
off,  unhappy  things,  the  poet's  mouth  was  for  ever 
closed.  Would  any  friend  of  Ernest  Dowson's,  being 
as  a  friend  acquainted  with  the  exquisite  sensitiveness 
of  the  man,  have  thrown  open  to  the  trampling  feet 
of  the  mob  this  holy,  private,  and  most  particular 
spot  ? 

I  am  well  aware  that  the  composition  of  the  homily 
exacted  some  plausible  explanation  of  the  motives 
which  led  to  that  later  conduct  on  which  the  moralist 
was  to  expatiate  with  such  earnestness  and  effect,  and 
that  since  Ernest  Dowson  had  to  be  handed  down  to 
posterity  branded  as  a  drunkard,  it  must  appear  an 
act  of  pure  friendship  to  show  first  what  drove  him 
to  drunkenness.  The  truth  was  elsewhere  ;  it  was 
known  to  those  who  were  really  his  friends ;  it  was 
a  catastrophe  in  his  life  which  was  infinitely  more 
tragic  and  appalling  than  any  cross  in  love,  a  catastrophe 
infinitely  more  cruel  even  than  that  which  felled  poor 
Maurice  Rollinat  into  a  living  corpse,  one  of  those 
accursed  blows  of  Fate  which  in  their  ill-omened  and 
unreasoning  barbarity  shake  to  its  very  foundations  a 
man's  faith  in  the  goodness  that  directs  the  destinies 
of  men.  It  was  the  ruin,  complete  and  orbicular,  ot 
any  chance  of  peace  or  happiness  in  this  world.  It 
was  one  of  those  crushing  blows  which,   when  they   do 


THE    CATASTROPHE    OF   A    LIFE      399 

not  kill  their  victim  outright,  leave  the  unhappy  man 
so  broken  in  spirit,  so  shattered  in  nerve,  so  entirely 
despairing  and  overwhelmed,  that  those  poor  convulsions 
which  are  his  after-acts,  however  inco-ordinate  and  even 
grotesque  they  may  be,  should  inspire  every  man  of 
heart  with  no  other  feeling  than  one  of  that  awed 
respect  with  which  one  contemplates  the  great  tragedies 
of  human   existence. 

To  this  tragedy  Ernest  Dowson  never  once  alluded, 
and  it  was  not  till  after  his  death  that  I  learned  why  it 
was  that  during  all  the  years  that  I  had  known  him  I 
had  never  once  seen  him  happy.  Men  under  the  pain 
of  great  sorrows  have  at  all  times  in  the  history  of  the 
world  laid  violent  hands  upon  themselves :  they  beat 
their  bosoms,  they  tear  their  hair,  they  cover  their 
heads  with  ashes.  The  sorrow  of  Ernest  Dowson 
lasted  as  long  as  his  life,  and  that  is  why  until  his 
death  he  afforded  to  his  friends  the  poignant  spectacle 
of  a  man  deliberately  bent  on  self-destruction.  In  the 
very  disorder  of  his  dress  one  saw  the  sackcloth  of 
Biblical  days.  His  drunkenness,  spasmodic  as  it  was, 
was  effect,  not  cause.  I  remember  how  impressed  I 
was  with  the  fact  that  the  same  spirit  prompted  him  as 
drives  other  unhappy  men  to  seek  in  the  duress  and 
physical  sufferings  of  La  Trappe  some  surcease  from 
the  intolerable  pangs  of  memory  or  conscience,  by  many 
acts  which  came  under  my  observation. 

In  1899  he  came  to  my  apartment  on  the  Boulevard 
Magenta,  and  asked  to  be  allowed  to  stay  with  me.  He 
told  me  that  he  was  frightened  of  his  room.  He  was  then 
living  in  a  room  in  the  Hotel  d'Odessa,  near  the  Gare 
Montparnasse,  and  he  said  that  he  dreaded  returning  there. 
This  fear,  which  has  been  observed  in  others  also,  is 
one  of  the  symptoms  of  the  most  acute  neurasthenia. 


400  TWEN  TV   YKARS    IN    PARIS 

De  Maupassant  was  haunted  towards  the  end  by  the 
same  dread.  I  told  Dowson  that  he  was  welcome  ;  but 
as  I  had  no  bedroom  to  give  him,  I  offered  to  have  a 
bed  made  for  him  on  a  large  couch,  which,  fitted  with 
springs  and  comfortably  upholstered,  would  have  made 
an  excellent  substitute  for  a  bedstead  with  mattresses. 
At  the  same  time  there  stood  in  my  study  another  sofa, 
which  was  covered  with  American  cloth,  and  which  was 
the  hardest  and  most  uneasy  couch  that  upholsterer  ever 
devised.  I  had  bought  it  on  this  very  account,  so  that 
I  should  only  seek  repose  upon  it  during  my  labours, 
when  extremest  fatigue  compelled  me.  Dowson  re- 
fused the  soft  couch  and  insisted  on  sleeping  on  the 
hard  one.  He  would  allow  no  bed  to  be  made  up  for 
him,  but  just  threw  himself  upon  the  sofa  in  his  clothes. 
He  would  not  even  remove  his  boots.  In  this  uncom- 
fortable way  he  spent  most  of  the  nights  during  the 
six  weeks  that  he  remained  with  me.  I  could  cite 
many  other  examples  of  the  deliberate  way  in  which 
he  used  to  inflict  pain  and  discomfort  on  his  body,  as 
though  his  soul  wished  to  revenge  itself  upon  its  earthly 
coil  for  what  it  had  suffered  through  its  agency. 

I  first  met  Dowson  in  London,  at  some  Bohemian 
chambers  in  the  Temple.  Even  in  those  days  his 
future  might  have  caused  anxiety  to  his  friends,  for 
already  at  that  time  his  visits  were  not  welcomed. 
The  tenant  of  those  chambers,  endowed  with  that 
racial  flair  which  scents  dissolution  and  reveals  to 
those  who  possess  it  which  men  amongst  their  ac- 
quaintances are  not  going  to  be  prosperous  in  life, 
was  already  treating  him  with  coldness.  Still,  in  those 
days  his  career  was  full  of  promise.  He  had  written 
one  novel,  The  Comedy  of  Masks,  in  collaboration, 
which  was  a  commercial  as  well  as  an  artistic  success  ; 


ERNEST   DOWSON'S   WORK  401 

he  was  welcomed  as  a  contributor  to  the  reviews  which 
prided  themselves  on  being  guardians  of  the  English 
language  and  the  purity  of  style  ;  he  was  known  as 
the   author  of  many  beautiful   poems. 

He  was  at  that  time  living  in  the  dock-house  of  a 
dock  in  Stepney,  which  is  described  in  his  first  novel. 
It  had  come  to  him  from  his  fathers.  There  was 
employment  for  him  here  and  an  assured  existence 
amidst  surroundings  which  might  have  appealed  to 
his  poetic  nature.  All  the  romance  of  the  sea  was 
brought  to  his  very  feet.  The  great  ships  which  came 
into  his  dock  tor  repair  seemed  like  wounded  sea-birds 
beating  their  wings  upon  his  threshold.  Animation, 
variety,  colour  embellished  a  scene  over  which  the 
hundred  different  types  of  seafaring  men  from  all  parts 
of  the  world  passed  to  and  fro.  But  already  in  those 
days  all  things  on  this  earth  had  lost  their  power  of 
appealing  to  his  heart  or  imagination.  He  hunted 
after  suffering  with  the  eagerness  with  which  most 
men  pursue  pleasure. 

I  remember  that  one  night  when  I  had  accompanied 
him  down  to  Limehouse  and  he  had  settled  me  in  his 
home,  he  rushed  out  again  into  the  streets.  When 
he  returned  some  hours  later,  he  was  bleeding  from  a 
stab  which  he  had  received  in  the  forehead.  It  was 
a  nasty  wound,  and  the  striker's  purpose  obviously 
had  been  to  stab  him  in  the  eye.  He  said  nothing 
about  the  encounter,  but  he  seemed  highly  pleased  as 
he  surveyed  himself  in  the  glass.  I  do  not  doubt  now 
that,  having  purposely  provoked  some  ruffian  in  the 
i  streets,  he  felt  grateful  to  him  for  his  ready  response 
with  a  knife.  His  body  had  been  disfigured  ;  suffering 
had  been  awarded  to  him.  On  another  occasion  we 
were  riding  together  in  an  omnibus  in  the  Strand.     He 

26 


402  TWKXrV    VKARS   IN    PARIS 

had  been  talking  (juictK-  to  mc.  when  suddenly  his 
phrases  began  to  precipitate  themselves,  while  he 
w.ived  his  hantl  in  the  air.  He  closed  his  remarks 
with,  "  And  that  is  what  I  want  to  say,"  and,  so  saying, 
brought  the  palm  of  his  hand  violently  down  upon  the 
thigh  of  a  Guardsman  who  was  sitting  opposite  to  him. 
The  slap  was  a  painful  one,  and  the  soldier  expostulated. 
Dowson  immediately  retorted  by  asking  the  man,  who 
was  a  big,  strong  fellow,  to  step  outside  into  the  street 
and  fight.  I  had  great  difficulty  in  pacifying  him.  He 
taunted  the  soldier  with  cowardice  when  the  latter 
said  that  it  was  impossible  for  him,  being  in  uniform, 
to  engage  in  a  fight  in  the  street.  "  But,"  said  the 
Guardsman,  *'  if  you  like  to  come  to  Knightsbridge 
Barracks  to-morrow,  we'll  put  the  gloves  on  and  see 
who  is  the  better  man."  When  at  last  I  had  induced 
Dowson  to  leave  the  omnibus  and  was  remonstrating 
with  him  for  the  folly  of  provoking  a  man  who  could 
have  stunned  him  with  one  blow,  he  answered  in 
French,  "  Well,  and  if  it  pleases  me  to  be  beaten  ?  " 

In  those  convulsions — his  acts  after  the  tragedy  of  his 
life — there  were  not  wanting  movements  which  showed 
that  he  was  trying  to  save  himself.  Instinct  is  ever 
present  under  the  will  ;  and  in  his  case,  too,  instinct  now 
and  again  made  itself  manifest.  There  were  pathetic 
efforts  on  his  part  to  bring  order  into  the  chaos  of  his 
life.  I  have  in  my  possession  a  letter  which  he  wrote 
to  one  of  his  friends  in  which,  sending  him  a  sum  of 
money  to  keep  for  him,  he  begged  him  to  dole  it  out  at 
the  rate  of  so  much  a  week.  "  You  are  to  send  me  three 
pounds  every  Monday  ;  but  please  never  send  me  more 
than  three  pounds,  whatever  I  may  ask  for." 

At  the  time  when  he  came  to  me  in  Paris  his 
nerves  were  all  gone.     I  have  related  how  he  feared  to 


THE    DREAD   THAT    HAUNTED        403 

enter  his  room.  Before  that  dread  came  upon  him,  he 
had  told  me  that  there  was  a  statue  on  his  mantelpiece 
which  filled  him  with  terror.  "I  lie  awake  at  night  and 
watch  it.  I  know  that  one  night  it  means  to  come  down 
off  its  shelf  and  strangle  me."  He  was  so  nervous  that 
he  could  not  enter  a  shop  to  ask  for  anything.  He  was 
ever  haunted  with  the  perpetual  dread  of  falling  down 
paralyzed.  His  was  the  most  complete  case  of  neur- 
asthenia that  I  have  ever  witnessed.  He  could  not 
summon  up  the  energy  to  open  any  letter  that  came 
for  him. 

Once  he  asked  me  to  go  to  the  Hotel  d'Odessa  for 
him  and  see  if  one  had  come.  He  was  expecting  a 
letter  from  his  publisher,  which  might  or  might  not 
contain  a  cheque.  I  received  a  letter  from  the  hotel- 
keeper  and  took  it  to  Dowson,  who  was  waiting  a  long 
way  down  the  Rue  de  Rennes.  He  was  very  anxious 
to  know  if  the  money  had  come,  but  he  was  too  nervous 
to  open  the  packet  and  assure  himself.  He  put  it  into 
the  side-pocket  of  his  jacket,  and  gradually,  as  we  walked 
along,  worked  the  envelope  open.  At  last  he  cried  out, 
"  It's  all  right!  I  feel  the  frill  of  the  cheque!"  Some 
time  later,  having  written  to  some  friends  in  London 
for  money  to  enable  him  to  discharge  his  hotel  bill  and 
to  return  to  London,  he  left  the  registered  letter  which 
came  in  reply  unopened  for  four  days.  Part  of  the 
time  it  was  lying  on  the  floor  of  the  room  which  I  had 
assigned  to  him.     "  I  am  frightened  to  open  it,"  he  said. 

He  delighted  in  self-abasement.  In  this  way  he 
flung  ashes  on  his  head.  I  remember  once  asking  him, 
having  met  him  after  a  long  absence,  what  work  he  was 
doing,  for  I  knew  that  he  had  been  engaged  on  a  novel. 
"Hack-work!"  he  cried,  with  a  laugh  which  had  the 
exultation  in  it  of  the  damned.     He  neglected  his  clothes 


404  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

wilfully,  and  always  presented  a  dreadful  appearance. 
That  it  had  been  wilful  I  learned  when  he  was  dying. 
In  those  last  days  I  could  qive  him  no  greater  pleasure 
than  to  bring  home  to  our  cottage  a  new  shirt  or  a  clean 
collar  for  him,  and  to  put  it  on  him. 

He  has  been  represented  as  delighting  in  the 
company  of  outcasts — glad  to  drink  with  any  vagrom 
man  whom  he  met  with  in  his  staggering  revels.  It  is 
not  the  truth.  He  was  full  of  pride  and  reserve.  He 
fled  from  the  society  of  strangers  ;  and  as  to  the  populace, 
he  had  for  common  people  a  contempt  and  abhorrence 
for  which  I  sometimes  used  to  chide  him.  On  one 
occasion  during  the  last  days  of  his  life  a  lady  came  to 
see  me  at  the  cottage  in  London  where  he  was  living 
with  me.  Although  at  that  time  his  dislike  of  strangers 
had  assumed  a  morbid  tinge,  he  remained  quietly  in  the 
room  during  her  visit.  After  she  had  left  I  said,  "  Well, 
Ernest,  you  see  you  can  bear  the  company  of  strangers  ?" 
"  Oh,"  he  said,  "  I  did  not  mind  her.  I  could  see  that 
she  was  a  lady." 

It  was  some  months  after  he  had  returned  to  England 
that  I  saw  him  again.  I  heard  that  he  had  been  very 
ill,  and  that  he  was  living  in  a  garret  in  the  Euston 
Road.  I  visited  him  there  one  Sunday  morning  as  I 
was  on  my  way  to  King's  Cross  Station,  where  I  was 
to  take  the  train  for  a  country  house  in  Hertfordshire. 
I  found  him  living  at  the  top  of  a  house  exactly  opposite 
St.  Pancras  Church — one  of  those  old-fashioned  build- 
ings which  have  since  been  pulled  down,  with  the 
exception,  I  think,  of  the  one  which  so  grudgingly 
sheltered  poor  Dowson. 

I  found  him  in  bed,  though  it  was  past  noon,  and  he 
told  me  that  he  had  been  lying  there  since  the  preceding 
Friday.      I  said  that  I   hoped  that  his  wants  had  been 


HIS    DESOLATE   CONDITION  405 

attended  to,  and  he  said  that  his  landlady  supplied  him 
with  nothinor  but  a  small  breakfast.  "  And  I  don't  think 
that  she  will  let  me  have  that  very  long,"  he  said  ;  "for 
I  am  in  arrears  with  my  rent,  and  they  are  pressing  me 
for  it.  Every  morning  now  there  is  a  note  from  the 
landlord  on  my  tray,  asking  me  whether  *  I  consider 
myself  a  gent,'  and  threatening  to  turn  me  out."  I  went 
to  get  him  some  provisions  and  a  bottle  of  wine,  and 
I  remember  walking  up  and  down  the  Euston  Road 
waiting  for  the  "  Rising  Sun"  to  open  its  doors,  full  of 
very  mournful  forebodings  for  my  friend. 

I  returned  from  Hertfordshire  the  next  afternoon 
and  went  to  see  him  again.  I  found  him  just  as  I  had 
left  him  ;  he  had  not  stirred  from  his  bed.  He  was  just 
too  wretched  and  depressed  to  make  any  effort  on  behalf 
of  himself.  I  induced  him  to  get  up,  and  I  took  him 
out.  He  showed  me  a  small  confectioner's  shop,  where, 
he  said,  "  I  get  my  meals  when  I  get  any."  It  was  a 
place  where  he  could  buy  buns  and  glasses  of  milk.  He 
told  me  that  he  was  working  for  a  publisher  who  paid 
him  weekly  when  he  sent  in  his  work,  but  that  for  weeks 
he  had  been  unable  to  do  any  writing. 

I  returned  to  see  him  several  times,  and  each  time 
found  him  lying  in  bed,  often  without  having  eaten 
anything  for  twenty-four  hours.  Then  came  a  period 
of  several  days  when  I  did  not  see  him.  I  had  my 
own  spinning  to  mind,  as  they  say  in  Yorkshire.  One 
evening  I  went  into  the  Bodega  in  Bedford  Street  to 
write  some  letters  in  the  room  downstairs.  While  I 
was  writing,  some  one  touched  me  on  the  shoulder.  I 
turned  round  and  started,  for  it  was  as  if  some  one  from 
the  grave  was  standing  at  my  side. 

It  was  poor  Ernest.  He  told  me  that  though  he 
was  very  ill,  he  had  been  driven  by  the  threats  of  his 


4o6  'l'\Vi:xrV    VF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

landlord,  who  \v;is  an  I  tali. in  music-master,  to  leave  his 
bed  and  ji^o  to  the  office  of  his  publisher  to  appeal  for 
help.  The  publisher  had  left  on  a  holiday  ;  there  was 
no  chance  of  his  getting-  any  money,  and  he  was  trying 
to  brace  up  his  courage  to  return  to  the  Euston  Road 
to  face  his  landlord  with  empty  hands.  I  asked  him  if 
half  a  sovereign  would  help  him,  and  as  I  passed  it  to 
him  I  felt  his  hand.  It  was  in  an  abominable  state. 
"  Dovvson,"  I  said,  "  you  are  very  ill,  and  I  am  not  going 
to  let  you  return  to  that  place.  You  must  come  with 
me."  I  told  him  that  I  was  living  just  then  in  a  cottage 
in  Catford,  of  which  the  lower  part  was  let  out  to  a 
bricklayer  and  his  wife  ;  but  that  I  could  give  him  a 
pleasant  room  to  sit  in,  and  that  I  would  look  after  him 
until  his  affairs  might  take  a  turn. 

He  said  that  he  would  be  glad  to  come,  for  he  had 
not  the  courage  to  wrangle  for  further  grace  at  his 
lodgings.  "But,"  he  said,  "you  must  take  me  down 
first-class  to  Catford,  for  I  cannot  bear  to  be  with 
people."  I  remember  that  he  was  so  weak  that  I  had 
to  take  him  in  a  cab  to  Charing  Cross,  and  again  in  a 
cab  from  Catford  Station  to  my  home.  He  lived  with 
me  there  just  six  weeks,  the  last  days  of  his  short  life. 
My  first  desire  after  getting  him  home  was  to  send  for 
a  doctor ;  but  he  would  not  allow  me  to  do  so.  He 
said  that  he  was  suffering  only  from  the  after-effects  of 
influenza,  and  that  as  soon  as  his  strength  returned  he 
would  be  quite  well.  He  warned  me  that  if  I  brought 
anybody  to  see  him,  he  would  at  once  leave  the  house. 
This  was  because  he  suspected,  as  indeed  had  been  my 
intention,  that  I  might  bring  a  doctor  in  to  see  him  with- 
out letting  him  know  the  visitor's  quality.  Whenever  he 
heard  a  knock  at  the  door  downstairs,  he  used  to  jump 
up    from    his    chair,    hurry    off   into    his    bedroom,    and 


HIS    LAST   DAYS  407 

lock  himself  in.  He  never  left  the  house  after  he  had 
once  entered  it.  I  could  not  induce  him  to  come  for  the 
shortest  walk.  He  used  to  spend  his  days  sitting  in 
the  arm-chair  in  my  front  room,  which  was  a  pleasant 
and  sunny  place,  with  a  view  over  green  fields  in  front 
of  the  two  windows. 

We  were  not  prosperous  ;  indeed,  at  that  time  I  had 
been  glad  to  take  the  task  of  writing  a  pamphlet  on  some 
new  process  of  making  white  lead,  and  this  pamphlet  had 
to  be  produced  in  the  intervals  of  attending  to  his  wants. 
He  often  used  to  send  me  out  to  get  medicines  made  up 
for  him  from  prescriptions  which  he  found  in  Health  in 
the  Home  and  similar  publications.  But  the  seal  had 
been  set  upon  his  destiny.  There  were  no  remedies 
which  could  have  saved  his  life.  He  was  dying,  though 
we  did  not  know  it,  of  galloping  consumption.  There 
was  nothing  to  show  how  near  the  end  was.  He  made 
good  meals ;  he  was  cheerful ;  we  used  to  laugh  together, 
as  I  read  him  passages  from  my  work,  on  the  pass  to 
which  the  Parnassians  had  come.  A  pathetic  circum- 
stance was  that  he  believed  that  the  disposal  of  the 
remainder  of  his  interest  in  the  property  at  Limehouse 
would  place  a  sum  of  ^600  or  ^700  at  his  dis- 
posal ;  and  he  used  to  talk  with  pleasurable  anticipa- 
tion of  what  he  would  do  when  he  had  received  this  money. 
His  plan  was  to  find  some  agreeable  companion  who 
would  share  expenses  and  go  with  him  to  the  South  of 
France.  The  fact  was  that  there  was  nothing  to  come 
to  him  from  the  property  ;  but  the  illusion  was  a  pleasant 
one,  and  he  did  not  live  to  face  the  disappointment  of 
learning  the  truth. 

After  he  had  been  four  weeks  with  me,  urgent  business 
called  me  to  France.  I  had  some  work  to  do  which,  in 
the  state  of  my  affairs,  it  was  impossible  for  me  to  neglect. 


4oS  TWFNTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

I  had  taken  leave  of  him,  havino-  arranj^t-d  for  care  to  be 
taken  of  him  in  my  absence,  and  had  proceeded  to 
Catford  Station,  there  to  take  the  train  to  London,  on 
my  way  to  France.  As  I  was  walking  up  and  down  the 
platform,  thinking  of  Dowson.  a  promjjting  came  to  me 
to  return  to  him.  I  tried  to  resist  the  feeling,  for  it  was 
urgent  that  I  should  not  postpone  any  longer  the  work 
which  I  had  undertaken  to  do.  But  the  feeling  grew 
stronger  and  stronger.  At  last  I  threw  my  ticket  away 
and  returned  home.  He  was  pleased  to  see  me.  He 
said  he  had  been  almost  expecting  me  to  come  back,  and 
I  promised  him  then  that  I  would  stay  with  him  until,  as 
he  had  for  some  time  past  been  arranging  to  do,  he  had 
gone  to  live  with  another  friend  who  had  rooms  in 
Bromley.  But  the  friend  in  Bromley  was  unable  to 
receive  him  as  soon  as  he  had  expected,  and  so  it 
happened  that  Ernest  Dowson  was  with  me  to  the  end. 
We  used  to  sit  together  all  day  talking  of  literature  and 
of  Paris  days.  At  times  he  put  out  his  hand  and  touched 
mine,  and  said  that  he  was  happy  that  he  had  met  me. 
I  think  that  those  last  days  of  peace  and  quiet  were  as 
happy  as  any  that  had  been  allowed  him  in  life. 
He  read  all  the  books  that  I  had  in  the  house,  but 
Esmond  yf2iS  his  favourite  volume.  He  used  to  take  it  to 
bed  with  him,  and  it  was  by  his  side  when  he  breathed 
his  last. 

On  the  day  before  his  death,  towards  evening,  his 
condition  began  to  cause  me  serious  alarm.  He  had 
wished  to  dictate  a  letter  to  me  which  was  intended  for 
his  friend,  the  co-author  of  his  novels.  But  he  could  not 
form  the  opening  phrase.  "  I  feel  too  tired,"  he  said. 
Still,  that  night  I  could  not  induce  him  to  go  to  bed. 
He  sat  up  till  five  in  the  morning,  and  even  after  he  had 
retired  to  his  room  he  kept  shouting  out  to  me  not  to  go 


ERNEST   DOWSON'S   DEATH  409 

to  sleep,  but  to  talk  with  him.  I  remember  that  we 
discussed  Oliver  Twist,  and  to  a  remark  I  made  that  I  did 
not  think  that  for  anything  that  Fagin  could  have  told 
him  Bill  Sikes  would  have  murdered  Nancy,  he  answered, 
"  No,  he  would  have  gone  for  Fagin."  He  would  not 
let  me  go  to  sleep.  He  wished  to  be  convivial.  At  six 
in  the  morning  he  asked  me  to  drink  some  Gilbey's  port 
which  was  in  his  room.  At  eight  in  the  morning  he  was 
coughing  badly,  and  he  sent  me  to  the  chemist's  to  get 
him  some  ipecacuanha  wine,  which  he  said  relieved  him. 
But  after  this,  as  he  still  continued  to  cough  badly,  I 
declared  that  a  doctor  must  be  fetched.  The  doctor 
arrived  an  hour  after  the  poor  fellow  had  died.  I  had 
gone  downstairs  to  fetch  something,  and  as  I  was  coming 
up  again  I  called  out,  "  You  had  better  get  up,  Ernest, 
and  sit  in  the  armchair.  You  will  breathe  more  easily." 
As  I  entered  the  room,  a  woman  who  was  in  attendance 
in  the  house  pointed  to  the  bed.  I  looked,  and  saw  that 
his  forehead  was  bathed  in  perspiration.  I  went  and 
raised  him  up,  and  while  I  was  wiping  his  brow  his  head 
fell  back  on  my  shoulder.  He  was  dead.  I  remember 
that  the  woman  then  asked  me  for  two  coppers  to  put  on 
his  eyes,  and — which  shows  how  poor  we  were — it  was 
she  who  had  to  advance  the  coins. 

A  telegram  to  an  address  which  he  had  once  given 
me  brought  down  to  Catford  one  of  his  relatives,  a  kind 
old  gentleman  who  told  me  that  but  for  Ernest's  pride 
and  sensitiveness  he  could  have  had  from  his  relations 
anything  that  he  needed  ;  but  that  none  of  them  had  had 
any  conception  of  the  condition  to  which  he  had  fallen. 
This  gentleman  relieved  me  of  great  perplexity.  I  had 
wondered  how  the  body  was  to  be  buried  without 
recourse  to  the  parish  authorities.  He  provided  for 
everything. 


410  TWKXTV   YKARS    IN    PARIS 

A  policeman  came  from  the  coroner's  office  to 
inquire  into  tlic  circumstances  of  this  death  ;  the  terrace 
was  agog  with  rumours.  I  was  examined  at  length  ;  my 
motives  in  housing  the  dead  ])oct  did  not  seem  clear  to 
the  officer.  Here,  again,  the  old  gentleman  was  of  ser- 
vice to  me.  He  was  able  to  assure  the  policeman  that 
the  deceased  had  had  no  property,  that  nothing  had  been 
made  away  with.  In  the  end,  the  coroner's  officer  shut 
up  the  pocket-book  in  which  he  had  been  taking  copious 
notes,  and  remarked,  "Well,  I  think  that  I  can  report  to 
the  coroner  that  there  is  no  reasonable  cause  for  suspicion 
in  this  case."  Before  he  left,  Dowson's  relative  replaced 
with  two  large  silver  coins  the  pence  which  the  woman 
had  placed  on  the  eyes  of  the  corpse.  He  told 
her  that  these  coins  were  to  be  hers  after  they  had 
served  their  purpose.  What  ensued  would  not,  I  am 
sure,  have  occurred  in  any  other  country.  No  sooner 
had  we  left  the  house  than  the  woman  removed  the  coins 
from  where  they  lay,  and  went  off  to  drink  herself  drunk 
on  beer  in  the  nearest  four-ale  bar. 

I  had  communicated  the  news  of  his  death  to  the 
papers,  and  soon  my  little  cottage  was  flooded  with 
messages  of  sympathy.  I  had  to  hear  over  and  over 
again  that  "  If  I  had  only  known"  from  friends  whose 
consciences  were  touched,  that  pitiful  subterfuge  of 
egotism  which  sets  the  shoulders  of  a  man  who  knows 
the  world  shrugging  in  spite  of  himself.  Costly  wreaths 
were  sent  in  abundance  to  the  man  whose  death  had 
undoubtedly  been  hastened  on  by  the  weeks  of  starvation 
which  he  had  undergone  in  his  garret  in  the  Euston 
Road,  and  his  hearse  was  followed  to  the  Roman 
Catholic  ^    cemetery   in   Lewisham   by  a  numerous  con- 

^  He  had  joined  the  Catholic  Church  while  a  student  at  Oxford. 
He  used  to  say  that  it  was  the  only  logical  religion.     But  I  fancy  the 


HIS    POSTHUMOUS   SUCCESS  411 

course.  To-day  his  work  has  so  far  advanced  in  the 
public  esteem  that  his  poems  have  recently  been  repub- 
lished, and  his  autographs  find  ready  purchasers  at 
high  prices.     They  are  pitifijl  letters  for  the  most  part. 

poetry  and  the  legend  of  the  history  of  that  Church  more  strongly 
appealed  to  his  imagination  than  any  dogma  to  his  reason.  In  a  side 
chapel  in  the  Church  at  Arques,  where  he  spent  some  months  of  his 
life,  there  is  the  picture  of  a  martyred  virgin  from  whose  chin  a  long 
beard  grows.  It  is  related  of  him  that  he  used  to  spend  hours  on  his 
knees  in  adoration  before  the  altar  over  which  this  painting  hangs. 


CHAPTER    XXIV 

Oscar  Wilde — His  Kindness  to  Ernest  Dowson — My  Friendship  with  him 
— The  Story  of  my  Book — Subjective  or  Objective  ? — What  crawled 
between  us — De  Profundis—The.  Implacability  of  Wilde's  Enemies — • 
The  Obvious  Sincerity  of  his  Prison  Book— Outward  Evidence  of  this 
Sincerity — His  Kindness  to  his  Fellow-Prisoners — A  Pupil  in  French. 

ONE  of  the  kind  acts  which  were  done  by  Oscar 
Wilde,  after  his  release  from  prison,  while  he  was 
living  in  Berneval  under  the  name  of  Sebastian  Melmoth, 
was  to  offer  to  Ernest  Dowson  a  temporary  refuge  in 
his  villa  there.  Dowson  had  been  staying  at  the  village 
inn  of  Arques  ;  he  was  deep  in  the  landlord's  debt  ; 
his  publisher  was  unwilling  to  make  further  advances. 
It  was  at  a  time  when  he  was  in  great  difficulty  that  Oscar 
Wilde  came  over  to  Arques  and  invited  him  to  come  to 
Berneval,  where  he  kept  him  until  his  affairs  improved. 
It  was  a  kind  act,  because  already  at  that  time  Oscar 
Wilde  himself  was  in  financial  straits  once  more.  Of 
the  considerable  sum  which  had  been  given  by  a  lady 
to  be  handed  to  him  on  his  release  from  gaol  only  a 
small  balance  had  come  into  his  hands  ;  his  mode  of  life 
at  Berneval  had  been  large  and  generous,^  and  at  the 
time  of  which  I  am  speaking  he  was  so  little  in  a  position 
to   entertain   friends   that  those   who  visited   him   there 

^  On  the  occasion  of  the  Queen's  Jubilee,  Mr.  Sebastian  Melmoth 
gave  a  dinner  to  the  forty  children  of  the  Berneval  village  school. 
Some  days  later  he  entertained  at  the  Caf^  des  Tribunaux  in  Dieppe 
a  famishing  deputation  of  Parisian  poets  at  a  Lucullian  banquet. 

412 


THE    STORY    OF   A   BOOK  413 

used   to  take  their  meals  at   their  own   charges  at  the 
neighbouring  hotel. 

It  is  not  my  purpose  here  to  relate  once  more  the 
story  of  my  long  friendship  with  that  great  and  unhappy 
man.     There  is  no  need  for  me  to  renew  that  unspeak- 
able  grief.     All    that   was   to    be  written   I   wrote,   and 
from    what    many    people    in    many  parts   of  the   world 
have   told   me  my  words  seem  to  them  as  though  they 
were  engraved  in  letters  of  steel  upon  a  granite  tablet. 
One  merit,  at   least,  that   book  possessed,  and  this  was 
that  when  I  wrote  it,  it  was  with  the  entire  self-detach- 
ment  of  a  man   who,   upon  his   deathbed,   whispers  so 
that   he  may  unburthen  a  heavy  heart  of  some  tale  of 
sorrow.      I    neither   sought    nor    expected    from    those 
writings  profit  or  repute.      In  the  early  spring  of  1902, 
living  at  that  time  in  a  garret  in  St.  Malo,  I   had  fallen 
into  a  great  state  of  weakness.     One  day  my  landlady 
brought  a  doctor  to  see  me, -and  after  he  had  gone  she 
came  back  and  told  me  that  he  had  said  that  it  would 
surprise  him  if  I   were  to  live  another  fortnight.     This 
prospect,  long  familiar  to  me  from  my  own  forebodings, 
disturbed  me  only  in  so  far  that   I   felt  great  regret  to 
have    delayed    so    long  in  writing  a  book  which  might 
win  for  a  dead  friend,  who  had  been  cruelly  misjudged, 
that  mercy  which  the  justice  of  men  should  never  banish 
from    its    councils,    because,    when    it    is    lacking,    their 
justice,  deprived  of    its  most  essential    element,   shows 
the   fierce  and    horrid   aspect   of    oppression.      That   I 
appealed  for  justice,  through  mercy,  aroused  the  anger 
of  other  friends  of  his,  whose  desire  would  seem  to  be 
to  see  him  take  his  place  in  history  as  a  victim  of  public 
intolerance,    as    a    forefighter    in    the    cause    of    larger 
liberties,  an   Alcibiades,    ostracized    yet  justifiable,    the 
martyred  highpriest  of  a  creed  abhorrent  to  prejudice  and 


414  rWl'XTV    VFARS    IN    PARIS 

ignorance  alone,  a  man  execrated  yet  triumphant.  In 
their  eyes  to  ask  lor  pity  was  to  paint  liim  as  a  king 
who  would  have  abdicated  ;  it  was  a  confession  of  the 
weakness  of  his  cause  ;  it  was  treachery  to  his  memory, 
an  unwarranted  repudiation  of  those  principles  which 
in  their  eyes  invested  him  with  his  particular  eminence. 
I  did  not  see  him  in  any  of  these  parts,  I  do  not  so 
see  him  now,  and,  for  the  rest,  did  ever  a  man  live  in 
this  world  for  whose  life  in  its  bearings  towards  his 
fellow-men  apology  was  never  needed  ? 

It  had  seemed  to  me  also  that  in  justice  to  my 
kinsmen,  to  my  private  friends,  and  to  that  large  con- 
stituency of  helpless  and  downtrodden  folk  whose  cause 
I  had  essayed  to  champion — for  their  sakes,  indeed, 
not  mine — I  was  in  duty  bound  to  write  this  book  and 
to  explain  a  friendship  which  I  had  never  claimed  in 
louder  tones  than  when  reproach  and  obloquy  were  the 
only  answers  which  the  public  voice  gave  back. 

The  doctor  had  not  read  my  case  aright,  but  his 
opinion  warned  me  that  if  my  book  were,  to  be  written 
at  all,  I  must  no  longer  delay.  That  same  hour  I  again 
took  my  unfamiliar  pen  in  hand,  and  I  remember  how 
at  that  moment  I  echoed  Zola's  cry  at  the  crushing 
weight  of  a  tiny  quill.  I  could  only  write  for  the 
briefest  periods  ;  some  days  saw  not  even  one  black 
furrow  traced  upon  the  white  plain  of  my  paper.  I  was 
all  alone ;  there  was  nobody  to  whom  I  could  cry,  as 
Alphonse  Daudet  did  in  a  similar  case,  "  Finis  mon 
bouquin."  I  often  felt  so  exhausted  that,  staggering 
from  my  table,  I  used  to  throw  myself  down  on  my 
bed,  never  thinking   to  rise  from   it  again. 

It  was  in  this  way  and  under  these  circumstances 
that  a  book  was  written  to  which  some  critics  have 
pointed    as    the  work   of  egotism.       That  I   treated  the 


SUBJECTIVE    OR   OBJECTIVE  415 

tragedy  of  my  friend's  life  and  destiny  subjectively  was 
made  a  reproach,  as  though  indeed  it  would  have  been 
possible,  in  view  of  the  attitude  of  the  public,  to  present 
my  friend's  sufferings  in  any  other  way.  Not  for 
Zoilus,  indeed,  but  for  my  friends,  will  I  here  declare 
that  the  very  reason  why  I  had  tarried  so  long  before 
beginning  my  work  was  that  whilst  an  objective  treat- 
ment of  the  tragedy  seemed  to  me  one  which  would 
never  gain  a  hearing,  I  was  loth  to  give  to  my  own 
personality  the  prominence  which  the  other  mode  would 
involve.  I  had  the  teaching  of  Carlyle  in  mind  ;  I  had 
not  forgotten  what  Oscar  Wilde  himself  had  written 
on  the  question  which  presents  itself  to  every  literary 
artist  when  face  to  face  with  his  subject.  The  doctor's 
ultimatum  solved  the  dilemma.  I  could  indicate  to  my 
readers  through  the  emotions  which  I  had  experienced 
the  tremendous  incidence  of  my  friend's  tragedy  on 
those  who  had  known  and  loved  him,  and,  being  myself 
no   more,   would  surely  be  absolved  of  egotism. 

Of  what  I  there  wrote,  I  need  only  here  repeat, 
that  I  first  met  Oscar  Wilde  in  Paris  in  1883,  at  the 
house  of  a  Greek  lady,  and  at  a  dinner-party  at  which 
I  was  also  first  introduced  to  Paul  Bourget  and  John 
Sargent  ;  that  we  became  friends  at  once,  and  spent 
many  weeks  in  Paris  in  each  other's  company  ;  that 
after  this  first  period  we  frequently  met  in  London  and 
Paris  ;  that  I  lived  for  some  time  in  the  same  house 
with  him  in  Charles  Street,  Grosvenor  Square,  and 
that  it  was  there  that  he  announced  his  engagement 
to  me  ;  that  after  his  accession  to  wealth  and  popularity 
I  saw  but  little  of  him,  and  that  indeed  a  few  weeks 
before  his  catastrophe,  dining  at  his  house,  he  appeared 
to  me  so  altered  that  I  feared  that  our  friendship  was 
drawing  to  its  close  ;  that  when  the  scandal  broke  out 


4i6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

I  refused  to  believe  in  his  guilt  of  the  charges  brought 
against  him,  basing  this  faith  on  the  fact  that  during 
all  the  years  I  had  known  him  there  had  not  been  a 
single  word  of  his  that  I  had  heard  nor  a  single  act 
of  his  that  I  had  witnessed  to  warrant  any  such  sus- 
picion ;  that  I  was  with  him  for  some  time  preceding 
his  last  trial,  and  profoundly  admired  the  grandeur  of 
soul  which  he  displayed  under  the  terrible  circumstances 
of  his  position  ;  that  after  his  trial  I  repeatedly  visited 
him  in  prison,  and  was  able  to  reconcile  his  wife  to 
him  ;  that  after  his  release  we  met  again  in  France  and 
resumed  our  friendship,  but  that  he,  having  returned  to 
other  friends,  his  manner  towards  me  became  distant  ; 
that  it  was  then  that  the  friendship  became  an  unhappy 
one  ;  that  I  was  away  from  Paris  during  his  last  illness 
and  unable  to  follow  his  hearse  to  the  grave. 

After  his  return  from  Naples  to  settle  down  in  Paris, 
I  saw  little  of  him.  In  the  first  place,  as  a  consequence 
of  repeated  hammer-blows  of  destiny,  I  had  been  beaten 
down  into  a  condition  not  much  removed  from  that  of 
Dowson  in  his  last  days.  Evil  days  had  come  upon  me  ;  I 
had  not  the  strength  to  fight  against  adversities  which  for 
the  most  part  directly  resulted  from  the  share  I  had  taken 
in  the  misfortunes  of  my  friend.  He  never  came  to  see 
me  ;  he  avoided  my  company,  I  did  not  blame  him. 
The  poor  man  was  sorely  embarrassed.  The  blind 
cannot  lead  the  blind,  and  those  who  fall  wounded  in  the 
battle  of  life  must  even  draw  out  their  agonies  alone. 
At  the  same  time  in  those  years,  1898  and  1899,  he 
used  to  frequent  people  whom  it  was  impossible  for  me 
to  meet,  men  classed  in  Paris  as  social  outcasts,  who  in 
reprisal  for  my  having  turned  my  back  upon  them  after 
a  public  exposure  of  their  infamy,  lost  no  opportunity 
of  poisoning  against  me  the  mind  of  the  man  of  whose 


WHAT   CRAWLED    BETWEEN    US      417 

friendship  I  had  been  so  proud.  If  I  had  any  reproach 
to  make  against  Oscar  Wilde,  it  would  be  that  he  listened 
to  their  perfidious  falsehoods  ;  but  I  know  that  before 
he  died  he  had  long  since  come  to  learn  the  real  character 
of  these  men,  and  was  sorry  to  have  allowed  them  to 
crawl   between  us. 

Of  his  prison  life  we  never  spoke  together,  and 
though  I  believe  that  at  times  he  did  refer  to  it,  I  was 
never  present  on  such  an  occasion.  And  by  reason  of 
the  circumstance  which  I  describe  above,  I  was  little  in 
his  company  in  the  year  immediately  preceding  his  death. 
But  from  other  sources  I  have  gained  a  full  knowledge  of 
the  sad  history  of  his  life  after  the  catastrophe. 

The  question  has  been  much  agitating  the  public 
mind  of  late  all  over  the  world  whether,  when  he  wrote 
De  Profundis,  Oscar  Wilde  was  sincere  in  his  repentance 
and  in  his  purpose  to  draw  good  in  the  future  out  of 
his  atrocious  humiliations  and  sufferings.  Here  once 
more  his  remorseless  enemies  saw  their  opportunity  to 
wreak  a  final  vengeance  on  his  memory.  "  Even  you," 
wrote  to  me  some  time  ago  an  English  grande  dame, 
"  seem  hardly  to  know  how  the  run  of  English  society 
hated  him  " — she  was  writing  of  the  period  before  his 
disgrace.  "  I  was  never  allowed  to  ask  him  to  our 
house.  How  unconscious  he  must  have  been  of  this 
hatred  when  he  thought  that  society  would  stand  up 
for  him ! " 

He  had  wilfully  offended  so  many  people  that  one 
does  not  wonder — human  nature  being  what  it  is — 
that  he  aroused  hatreds  which  are  implacable  even 
before  the  spectacle  of  his  abandoned  grave.  I  noted 
down  some  time  ago,  as  I  re-read  his  books  and  plays, 
many  passages  in  which  he  seemed  deliberately  to  lay 
himself  out  to  vex  in  their  self-esteem  entire  professions, 

27 


4i8  T\V1:N"I"V    VKARS    IX    PARIS 

whole  classes  of  society.  Now  a  wound  to  his  self- 
esteem  is  the  one  thing  a  man  never  forgives,  never 
can  forgive.  The  reason  of  this,  I  believe,  is  that  our 
self-esteem  is  merely  our  confidence  in  our  own  power 
of  resistance,  in  our  chances  of  survival  in  the  struggle 
for  life,  and  that  to  shake  this  self-esteem  or  confidence 
in  a  man  is  to  inspire  him  with  doubts  of  these  chances, 
to  fill  him  with  the  most  distressing  forebodings,  and 
thus  to  earn  his  mortal  enmity.  The  tyrants  who  in 
former  days  put  to  death  by  cruel  tortures  the  bringers 
of  bad  tidings  manifested  this  enmity,  so  inspired,  with 
the  licence  habitual  to  them,  and  by  the  barbarity  of 
their  vengeance  demonstrated  its  degree.  Among  more 
civilized  people  and  in  urbaner  times  the  enmity  is  as 
intense,  even  if  the  mode  of  reprisal  be  less  violent  and 
immediate. 

I  cannot  understand  these  doubts  as  to  Oscar 
Wilde's  sincerity,  if,  indeed,  these  doubts  themselves 
be  sincere.  Even  in  taking  the  view  least  flattering 
to  his  memory,  one  might  point  out  that  such  revulsions 
of  purpose  and  inclination  have  been  commonly  observed 
in  the  most  licentious  of  men.  For  no  other  object  than 
to  foster  this  revulsion  was  La  Trappe  founded.  We 
read  of  Henri  III.  ot  France,  who,  by  his  affectations, 
his  sybaritic  tastes,  his  effeminate  love  of  personal  adorn- 
ments, fine  clothes,  perfumes,  jewels,  his  reckless  quest 
of  indulgence  and  pleasure,  may  well  figure  as  a  proto- 
type of  the  Oscar  Wilde  of  the  popular  legend,  that  at 
times  a  moral  reaction,  which  lasted  for  a  longer  or  a 
shorter  period,  was  observed  in  him  also.  "  Ouelquefois 
il  se  depouillait  de  ses  riches  atours,  et  s'arrachait  a  sa 
vie  voluptueuse.  On  le  voyait  alors  couvert  d'un  sac  de 
penitent,  un  gros  chapelet  a  la  main,  parcourir  les  rues 
en  procession,  faire  des  retraites  chez  les  capucins,  et  ne 


HISTORIC    PARALLELS  419 

prendre  que  le  nom  de  frere  Henri.  *  II  se  fit  batir  un 
grand  et  beau  logis  au  marche  aux  chevaux,  avec  cer- 
taines  petites  cellules,  pour  aller  la  passer  quelques 
semaines  en  simagrees  de  devotion.'  "  It  is  but  a  mani- 
festation of  that  instinctive  return  under  the  thrall  of 
discipline  which  Wordsworth  explains  in  his  sonnets. 
It  is  that  reaction  from  excess  of  liberty,  from  excess 
of  power  which  sent  Charles-Quint  knocking  at  the  doors 
of  Saint-Just.  Indeed,  this  last  example  is  the  apter 
one,  for  the  story  of  Charles-Quint  after  his  abdication 
illustrates  that,  however  sincere  a  man  may  be  in  his 
renunciation  of  his  own  prepotence,  his  old  nature  may 
triumph  over  his  newly  formed  resolutions,  and  circum- 
stance may  undo  them. 

I  am  often  written  to  by  people  who  ask  me  to  help 
them  to  form  an  opinion  on  the  sincerity  or  insincerity 
of  Oscar  Wilde  while  he  was  writing  De  Profundis.  In 
advising  them  to  believe  him  sincere  I  present  no  argu- 
ments drawn  from  psychology.  I  inform  them  of  a  fact 
which  must  appeal  to  an  average  mind.  This  fact  is  that, 
at  the  time  when  he  was  writing  this  book,  opportunities 
offered  themselves  to  him  in  prison  to  obtain  tobacco 
and  spirits,  and  that  the  man  who  had  formerly  been  a 
slave  to  one  at  least  of  these  indulgences  refused  to  take 
advantage  of  these  offers,  although  he  might  have  done 
so  without  any  risk  resulting  from  so  grave  a  breach  of 
prison  regulations.  Everybody  knows  that  to  the  smoker 
the  privation  of  tobacco  is  one  of  the  worst  sufferings 
of  prison  life,  and  that  men  in  prison  will  do  anything, 
will  incur  any  danger,  for  one  chance  to  indulge  them- 
selves. I  believe  that  Oscar  Wilde's  refusal  proceeded 
simply  from  his  determination  that  from  the  new  life  all 
self-indulgence  should  be  excluded,  and  I  hold  that  in 
itself  alone  it  is  a  good  proof  of  his  sincerity. 


420  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Some  people  write  and  tell  me  that  they  have  heard 
that  while  he  was  writing  De  Profundis  he  was  at  the 
same  time  writinp^  "  letters  of  a  very  different  sort." 
Here  the  same  calumny  is  at  work  which  has  set  afoot  an 
atrocious  stor}'  to  which  in  a  recent  letter  a  lady  drew 
my  attention.  "  A  dreadful  story  goes  round  still,"  she 
writes,  "  that  the  night  he  heard  of  his  wife's  death  he 
borrowed  evening  clothes  to  go  to  a  party,  to  show  how 
little  he  cared."  Did  I  need  to  qualify  as  "atrocious," 
or  my  correspondent  as  "  dreadful,"  a  story  so  obviously 
untrue  ? 

As  to  these  letters  which  he  wrote  in  prison,  I  suppose 
that  reference  is  made  to  one  or  two  little  notes  that  he 
was  able  to  pass  to  fellow-prisoners,  who,  on  their  release 
from  gaol,  made  haste  to  dispose  of  these  autographs. 
I  have  seen  some  of  these  letters,  and  I  am  wondering 
how  his  bitterest  enemy  could  see  in  them  any  proof  that 
while  he  was  writing  De  Profimdis  his  child-like  sim- 
plicity had  changed  into  hypocrisy.  Here  is  a  specimen 
of  one  of  these  notes,  written  in  answer  to  an  inquiry 
from  a  fellow-prisoner  as  to  how  he  had  passed  his 
Sunday.  It  is  written  on  the  inside  of  a  prison  envelope, 
with  "  On  Her  Majesty's  Service  "  printed  across  the 
top  of  the  paper.^  "  Have  had  a  very  good  Sunday, 
reading  Goethe's  Faust,  a  very  great  work  of  art.  The 
silly  chaplain,  bleating  from  the  reading-desk  and  bawling 
from  the  pulpit,  makes  me  sick  with  rage  ;  but  I  enjoyed 

^  As  to  the  writing  of  this  note,  the  Baroness  Isabelle  Ungern- 
Sternberg,  of  Reval,  in  Russia,  Vice-President  of  the  Graphological 
Society  of  Paris,  and  one  of  the  most  remarkable  adepts  in  the  grapho 
logical  science  in  the  world,  to  whom  I  submitted  it,  together  with  other 
pieces  from  his  pen,  stated  :  "  If  it  is  a  fact  that  this  note  was  written 
shortly  before  his  release  from  prison,  I  admire  the  serenity  of  soul, 
the  absence  of  all  bitterness  which  are  shown  in  the  writing.  It  is  more 
chastened,  almost  more  beautiful,  than  the  writing  of  his  youth." 


OSCAR   WILDE   AND   THE   CHAPLAIN     421 

the  lovely  sunlight."  It  is  possible  that  these  remarks 
about  the  chaplain  inspired  doubts  in  some  minds,  but  I 
am  not  aware  that  in  De  Profundis  Oscar  Wilde  under- 
took to  make  respect  for  individual  clergymen  one  feature 
of  his  reformation.  It  is  true  also  that  he  showed  an 
interest  in  certain  prisoners.  His  kindness  for  his  fellow- 
sufferers  went  so  far  that,  to  prevent  some  lads,  who 
were  mere  children,  from  stopping  in  gaol,  he  arranged 
for  the  payment  of  the  fines  to  which  they  had  been 
sentenced  for  poaching. 

After  he  had  left  prison,  and  was  living  in  Berneval, 
although  at  that  time  every  pound  was  of  consequence 
to  him,  he  sent  to  a  few  fellow-prisoners  who  had 
awakened  his  compassion,  certain  sums  of  money  on 
their  release.  One  of  the  youths  to  whom  he  thus 
showed  kindness  was  a  lad  who  acted  as  "cleaner"  to 
the  corridor  in  which  his  cell  in  Readino^  Gaol  was 
situated.  It  is  to  be  noted  that,  though  he  might  have 
taken  advantage  of  this  lad's  services  to  empty  his  slops 
and  to  fetch  water  for  him,  so  thoroughly  had  he  accepted 
all  the  humiliations  of  his  position  that  he  insisted  on 
performing  these  menial  offices  himself  He  was  greatly 
interested  in  the  little  fellow.  He  attempted  to  teach 
him  French,  and  the  youth  was  most  assiduous  in  his 
efforts  to  learn.  "He  had  obtained  an  old  French 
grammar  from  the  chaplain,"  my  informant  tells  me, 
"  and,  armed  with  a  slate  and  a  pencil,  he  would  sit  in 
his  cell  every  evening  worrying  his  brain  over  the  mys- 
teries of  French  conjugations.  In  the  morning,  when  he 
went  the  round  of  the  cells,  one  could  hear  him  greeting 
Mr.  Wilde  with  a  '  Bonjour,  monseer  ! '  pronounced  with 
the  vilest  English  accent.  When  Mr.  Wilde  left  the 
prison  he  did  not  forget  the  poor  little  cleaner,  but  sent 
him  £2,  as  I  have  been  told." 


422  rWFATV    Vi:.\RS    IN    PARIS 

His  life  after  he  left  prison  has  been  pointed  to  as  a 
proof  of  his  insincerity.      It  would  with  greater  aptness 
and  much  more  justice  serve  to  illustrate  the  cruelty  of 
society  towards  the  man   who  has  fallen,  a  cruelty  which 
extends  to  the  degree  of  preventing  him  from  carrying 
into  effect  such  good  resolutions  as  he  may  have  formed. 
If  you  strip  a  man  of  his  self-respect,   it  does  not  seem 
fair,   or  even  logical,   to  complain  that  his   acts  are    not 
those    of  a  self-respecting  man.      For  the   rest,    I    have 
never  heard  and  do  not  know  that  anything  that  Oscar 
Wilde  did  after  his  release  from  prison  justifies  any  one  in 
branding  him  with  the  most  terrible  word  which  mediaeval 
judges  could  write  up  over  the  stake  at  which  they  burned 
their  victims.  "  Relaps."     I  have  heard,  and  I  know,  that 
people  did  all  they  could — and  none  with  more  ferocity 
than  his  own  countrymen — to  drive  him  to  that  despair 
which    prompts    men    to    do    the    very    acts    for    which 
they   are   being  held  up  to  execration  ;  but  there  is  no 
proof  whatever  in   Oscar  Wilde's  case  that  his  despair 
carried  him  to  this  extreme.     He  was  hunted  from  place 
to  place  ;  he  was  never  for  one  instant  allowed  to  forget 
the  past  ;    people  took  delight  in  reminding  him  of  his 
disgrace.     It  was  the  same  in   Naples  as  it  was  in  Paris, 
in   Paris  as  in   Dieppe  ;  there  was  not  a  spot  on   earth 
where  he  could  feel  himself  free  from  insult.      He  was 
ordered  out  of  hotels  and  restaurants  and  ca/i^s  because 
some  passing  Englishman — some  petty  tyrant — desirous 
of  exercising  power,    might    warn    the    landlord   of   the 
danger  of  allowing  such  a  customer  to  be  seen   on  his 
premises. 

One  day  in  a  hairdresser's  shop  on  the  boulevards, 
Wilde,  who  had  been  shaved,  vacated  his  seat.  "  The 
next  of  these  gentlemen,  please,"  cried  the  hairdresser, 
speaking  to  a  group  of  customers  who  were  waiting  their 


"THE   MAN    WAS   AN    ENGLISHMAN"     423 

turn.  The  man  whose  right  it  was  to  be  attended  to 
next  was  an  Englishman.  He  had  recognised  Oscar 
Wilde,  and  he  called  out  so  that  everybody  in  the  big 
room  could  hear  him,  "If  you  wish  to  shave  me  you  must 
give  me  another  chair,  for  I  won't  sit  in  the  same  place 
as  that  fellow  who  has  just  got  up.  That  is  Oscar 
Wilde!"  "I  staggered  as  though  I  had  been  shot,"  said 
Oscar  in  speaking  of  this  outrage,  "and  I  went  reeling 
out  into  the  street  like  a  drunken  man."  And  that  is  but 
one  instance  of  the  affronts  which  were  constantly  put 
upon  him.  I  do  not  think  that  under  these  circum- 
stances the  moralist  could  justly  blame  him  for  any  excess 
to  which  despair  and  revolt  might  have  driven  him  ;  but, 
as  I  say,  there  is  no  proof  whatever  that  after  his  release 
from  prison  he  relapsed. 


CHAPTER   XXV 

Oscar  Wilde  in  Prison — Two  Years'  Hard  Labour — Wandsworth  Gaol — His 
Removal  to  Reading — His  Illness — His  Subsequent  Treatment — How 
De  Profundi s  was  Written — In  the  Exercise  Yard — His  Sympathy  with 
his  Fellow-Sufferers — His  Fears  for  the  Future — His  Departure  from 
Reading — Conversations  in  Prison — "  Read  Carlyle." 

I  HAVE  explained  that  my  Story  of  an  Unhappy 
Friendship  was  purely  subjective,  and  I  have 
given  the  reasons  why  I  selected  that  mode  of  treatment. 
It  did  not,  therefore,  coincide  with  the  scheme  of  the  book 
to  give  any  particulars  about  the  prison  life  of  Oscar 
Wilde,  although  I  was  singularly  well  informed  on  the 
subject.  To-day  circumstances  are  different.  Through 
the  publication  of  De  Profundis,  that  narrative  becomes 
one  to  which  the  history  of  literature  has  a  claim,  and  I 
see  no  further  reason  for  withholding  it.  I  will  give  it  in 
the  very  words  of  the  various  informants  from  whom 
I   collected  it : 

"  Two  years'  imprisonment  with  hard  labour  !  To 
the  uninitiated  this  mdy  not  seem  a  very  heavy  sentence, 
but  any  one  who  has  ever  been  in  an  English  prison 
knows  that  sentence  of  five  years'  penal  servitude  would 
be  less  severe,  for  the  simple  reason  that  the  longer 
sentence  would  be  served  in  a  convict  establishment. 
Added  to  this,  there  would  be  three  months  remitted  off 
every  year,  which  would  make  the   actual  time  served 

about  three  years  and  nine  months.      Convicts,  also,  are 

424 


TWO   YEARS'    HARD    LABOUR  425 

much  better  fed  and  are  more  in  the  open  air  than 
prisoners  in  local  or  county  prisons.  The  latter  do  their 
work,  or  the  greater  portion  of  it,  under  cover.  They 
are  employed  in  their  cells  picking  oakum,  making  mats 
or  mail-bags,  or  else  grinding  corn  in  the  mill-shed. 
Some,  of  course,  are  employed  at  stone-breaking  ;  but 
this  class  of  work  is  gradually  falling  into  desuetude. 
Mr.  Wilde,  therefore,  had  no  reason  to  endorse  the 
opinion  of  the  press,  i.e  that  he  had  received  a  lenient 
sentence.  The  first  prison  he  went  to  after  his  conviction 
was  Wandsworth,  and  though  his  experiences  in  this 
establishment  are  unknown  to  me,  yet  I  have  good 
reason  to  believe  that  they  were  anything  but  agreeable. 
It  appears  that  he  complained  so  often  to  the  visiting 
justices  that  the  authorities  were  glad  to  get  rid  of  him, 
and  soon  packed  him  off  to  Reading. 

"  There  are  three  wings  or  blocks  in  Reading  Gaol, 
called  A,  B,  and  C  respectively.  It  was  in  '  C '  block, 
in  the  third  cell  on  the  third  landing,  that  Oscar  Wilde 
was  incarcerated  ;  and  as  each  prisoner  takes  his  number 
from  that  of  the  cell,  thus  it  was  that  he  was  known  in 
prison  as  '  C.  3.  3.'  On  the  wall  outside  each  cell  door 
hangs  a  card  giving  the  name,  date  of  conviction,  and 
date  of  release  of  the  occupant.  On  the  card  of  C.  3.  3., 
however,  the  initials  of  his  name  only  were  given, 
O.  W.  O'F.  W.  This  was  done  for  the  purpose  of 
making  identification  impossible.  It  was  a  useless  pre- 
caution, however,  for  his  appearance  alone  sufficed  to 
distinguish  him  among  two  thousand  gaol-birds. 

"  When  he  first  came  to  Reading  he  was  put  to 
oakum-picking,  which  he  could  not  get  on  with  ;  then 
to  book-binding,  and  he  was  becoming  quite  an  expert 
in  the  art  when  he  became  ill  and  was  sent  to  the 
sick-ward.     He  remained  in  hospital  for  several  weeks, 


426  TWi'.XrV    Vl'ARS    IN    PARIS 

and  when  lie  came  oui  he  was  put  on  hght  labour  and 
medical  diet.  This  diet  consisted  of  a  pint  of  cocoa 
for  breakfast,  with  six  ounces  of  white  bread  and  one 
ounce  of  butter.  The  white  bread  was,  to  him,  an 
aj^reeable  change  from  the  ordinary  brown  bread,  which 
is  rather  nauseous  to  the  palate.  His  dinner  varied 
with  the  day.  Some  days  he  had  a  little  meat,  some 
four  ounces,  generally  two  potatoes,  and  a  little  bit 
of  suet  pudding  ;  other  days  he  would  have  soup  or 
a  pint  of  beef-tea,  as  the  doctor  might  order.  Indeed, 
he  was  seldom  heard  to  complain  in  regard  to  his  food. 
He  got  sufficient  to  stave  off  the  pangs  of  hunger, 
for  almost  invariably  there  was  something  left  in 
his  tin. 

"He  was  now  absolved  from  all  manual  labour, 
and  occupied  much  of  his  time  in  writing.  It  was 
understood  that  he  was  engaged  in  translating  German 
into  English.  I  fancy  this  must  have  been  more  con- 
genial to  his  taste  than  picking  oakum.  He,  of  course, 
had  to  keep  his  cell  clean  and  tidy.  He  washed  it  out 
carefully  every  morning,  and  should  the  warder  inad- 
vertently have  omitted  to  have  him  supplied  with  water 
for  that  purpose,  "  C.  3.  3."  quickly  drew  his  attention 
to  the  fact.  He  was  asked  one  morning  if  he  felt  any 
humiliation  in  doing  such  work,  and  he  was  heard  to 
answer,  '  Not  the  slightest.  I  consider  no  one  too  good 
to  do  his  own  work.' 

"In  his  cell  were  a  large  number  of  books  which 
had  been  sent  him  by  his  friends.  These  afterwards 
became  the  property  of  the  prison  authorities.  It  was 
a  graceful  concession  on  the  part  of  the  Prison  Com- 
missioners to  allow  this,  and  it  was  much  appreciated 
by  the  poor  prisoner.  '  What  would  I  be  without  my 
books?'   he    was  heard   to   say.      'Why,    I  should  gQ 


IN    HIS   CELL,    BY   NIGHT  427 

mad  ! '  And  there  is  no  doubt  that  he  spoke  the  truth 
and  that  he  would  have  gone  mad." 

One  who  sometimes  had  the  opportunity  of  looking 
into  his  cell  illustrates  the  preceding  passage,  and  said, 
speaking  to  me  with  tears  in  his  eyes,  "  Is  it  any 
wonder  that  he  paced  his  lonely  cell  night  after  night, 
talking  to  himself,  continually  talking  to  himself,  and 
laughing  to  his  imaginary  visitors — such  a  heart-rending 
laugh.  I  think  that  I  can  see  him  now  as  he  walks 
backwards  and  forwards  through  his  cell,  his  handsome 
face  sometimes  lit  up  by  an  inward  light  and  shining 
as  brightly  as  an  angel's.  Then  suddenly  he  would 
stop  dead  and  speak,  as  though  some  one  had  entered." 
His  light  burned  all  night  (this  was  another  privilege 
which  had  been  granted  to  him),  and  it  was  usually 
eleven  or  twelve  o'clock  before  he  retired  to  rest.  The 
other  prisoners  retired  at  eight. 

It  was  told  me  that  after  these  troubled  nights,  "in 
the  morning  he  would  appear  serene  and  smiling,  as 
though   he  had   slept  on  feathered  down." 

"  Both  the  chaplain  and  the  doctor  visited  Mr.  Wilde 
occasionally  in  his  cell,  but  he  never  seemed  to  derive 
much  pleasure  from  their  visits.  '  They  bore  me,'  he 
once  said,  '  and  their  conversation  is  uninteresting.'  " 

The  companion  to  whom  he  made  this  remark  said, 
"  Well,  surely,  if  you  find  the  conversation  of  these 
highly  educated  men  uninteresting,  what  must  you  find 
mine?"  He  answered,  "I  like  to  talk  with  people  who 
have  some  originality,  whether  they  be  educated  or 
not ;  I  detest  the  commonplace,  the  practical,  and  the 
stereotyped." 

"  After  Divine  service  he  went  out  into  the  yard  to 
exercise  along  with  the  other  prisoners.  He  got  plenty 
of  exercise,  for   he   invariably  had    two   hours   in   the 


428  TWENTY   YRARS    IN    PARIS 

mornino:  and  two  in  the*  afternoon.  This  exercise  took 
the  form  of  walking  round  a  stone-paved  circle.  There 
were  two  circles,  an  inner  and  an  outer  one.  The 
inner  circle  was  used  by  prisoners  who  were  lame,  sick, 
or  otherwise  enfeebled,  and  the  outer  one  by  the  strong 
and  healthy.  Mr.  Wilde  always  walked  on  the  outer 
ring  ;  he  took  long  and  rapid  strides,  which  soon 
brought  him  on  the  heels  of  the  man  in  front  of  him. 
This  used  to  cause  the  intervention  of  a  warder,  as 
an  interval  of  three  paces  has  to  be  kept  between 
each  prisoner,  to  prevent  them  from  talking.  It  was 
certainly  a  most  painful  sight  to  see  this  distinguished 
man  of  letters  in  such  company  and  living  under  such 
conditions. 

"  Yet,  withal,  he  smiled.  He  smiled  often.  He 
smiled  at  any  warder  who  had  won  his  regard  by 
speaking  to  him  in  a  humane  tone.  He  smiled  at  the 
little  birds  which  used  to  come  hopping  around  when 
the  prisoners  were  at  exercise.  He  smiled  at  his  fellow 
prisoners,  for  he  sympathized  with  them  deeply.  When 
any  of  the  prisoners  were  undergoing  punishment  for 
breaches  of  the  prison  rules,  it  used  to  vex  Mr.  Wilde 
very  much.  Indeed,  he  had  to  endure  the  pain  of 
others'  sufferings  as  well  as  his  own.  On  the  morning 
after  the  birching  of  a  prisoner  named  Prince,  a  soldier, 
he  was  seen  to  be  greatly  agitated.  In  defiance  of  prison 
rules  he  accosted  a  warder,  coming  out  to  him  with 
outstretched  arms,  and  cried  out,  '  Oh  !  what  a  dread- 
ful thing  has  happened !  '  The  warder  asked  him  what 
he  referred  to,  and  he  said,  '  That  poor  man  Prince. 
They  flogged  him  most  unmercifully  yesterday  after- 
noon. His  cries  are  ringing  in  my  ears  now.  Oh  ! 
it  was  dreadful,  dreadful  ! ' 

The  prison  lunatic  and    the    prison    child  were   the 


OSCAR  WILDE  AND  PRISON  CHILDREN    429 

especial  objects  of  his  commiseration.  He  was  heard 
more  than  once  to  exclaim,  '  What  brutes  those  magis- 
trates must  be  to  send  such  children  to  prison  ! ' 

The  spirit  was  moving  him  to  which  the  world 
owes  De  Profundis.  Will  those  who  deny  the  sincerity 
of  that  book  deny  also  the  pity  that  he  showed  ?  The 
awakening  of  this  spirit  in  him  is  described  in  his  own 
words,  in  an  article  by  Andre  Gide,  which  appeared  in 
the  French  Magazine  L'Ermiiage,  in  June,  1902,  and 
were  taken  down  by  the  French  writer  after  a  visit 
which  he  paid  to  Oscar  Wilde  at  Berneval,  directly 
after  his  release  from   prison. 

" '  The  Russian  writers  are  extraordinary,'  said 
Wilde.  '  What  makes  their  books  so  great  is  the 
pity  which  they  have  put  into  them.  Formerly,  don't 
you  know,  I  was  very  fond  of  Madame  Bovary ;  but 
Flaubert  would  have  no  pity  in  his  book,  and  that  is 
why  it  seems  small  and  narrow  ;  pity  is  the  side  of  a 
work  which  is  open,  by  which  it  appears  unbounded. 
Do  you  know,  it  was  pity  which  prevented  me  from 
killing  myself?  Oh,  during  the  first  six  months  I  was 
terribly  unhappy — so  unhappy  that  I  wished  to  kill 
myself;  but  what  kept  me  back  from  doing  so  was 
looking  at  the  others,  seeing  that  they  were  as  unhappy 
as  I  was,  and  feeling  pity  for  them.  Oh  dear !  pity 
is  an  admirable  thing  ;  and  I  did  not  know  what  pity 
was!'  (Gide  remarks,  '  He  was  speaking  in  a  low 
tone  of  voice  and  without  any  excitement.')  '  Have 
you  ever  grasped  what  an  admirable  thing  pity  is  ?  As 
for  me,  I  thank  God  every  night — yes,  on  my  knees, 
I  thank  God  every  night — for  having  taught  me  to 
know  it.  For  I  went  into  prison  with  a  heart  of  stone, 
thinking  of  my  pleasure  only ;  but  now  my  heart  is 
altogether  broken ;    pity   has    entered    into    it ;    I    have 


430  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

now  come  to   understand  that  pity  is   the  greatest  and 
most  beautiful  thin^-  in  this  world.  .   .   .'  " 

Some  of  my  correspondents  have  expressed  the 
doubt  that  De  Proftindis  was  written  in  prison  at 
all.  I  presume  this  doubt  arises  from  the  supposition 
that  Oscar  Wilde  would  have  had  no  time  nor  op- 
portunity to  write.  To  an  ordinary  prisoner,  indeed, 
such  an  opportunity  w^ould  have  been  wanting-.  But 
after  his  illness,  as  we  know,  he  was  allowed  to  occupy 
himself  in  his  cell  with  study  and  writing.  A  warder 
told  me  that  IMr.  Wilde  was  always  writing  towards  the 
end  of  his  time. 

"  Whilst  in  prison  he  wrote  and  wrote,  and  what  he 
wrote  about  I  never  knew,  for  I  always  neglected  to 
ask  him.  I  know  that  he  always  had  a  big  book  in  his 
cell — for  all  the  world  like  a  grocer's  ledger — and  in 
it  he  kept  writing  and  writing.  The  Chief  Warder  took 
it  to  the  Governor's  office  every  morning,  and  after 
the  Governor  had  glanced  over  it,  the  prisoner's  book 
was  taken  back  to  his  cell  again." 

It  must  have  been  in  this  book  that  De  Profnndis 
was  originally  written.  The  gods  have  no  other  ironies 
than  these,  and  never  another  book  might  serve  the 
artist  for  the  composition  of  his  supremest  work  of  art 
than  a  grocer's  ledger. 

Towards  the  end  of  his  time  his  financial  position 
was  a  source  of  great  anxiety  to  him.  A  friend  to 
whom  he  had  confided  his  trouble  said  to  him,  '  Well, 
I  have  got  ^5  put  by.  You  can  have  them  when 
you  go  out  if  you  will  give  me  an  address  where 
to  send  it  to.'  Oscar  Wilde  refused  the  proffered  loan, 
for  the  man  was  only  a  poor  workman.  The  man 
then  said,  '  You'll  miss  my  ^5  if  you  don't 
take   them,   when    you   wake   up   one   morning   and   find 


WHAT    FIVE    POUNDS   WOULD    BUY     431 

yourself  without  a  breakfast.'  '  I  hope  that  it  will 
\iever  come  to  that,'  said  Wilde ;  '  but  if  it  does,  I 
promise  to  write  to  you  for  your  ;^^,  and  I  will 
buy  a  sandwich  with  it,'  *  And  a  cigar,'  said  the 
man,  with  a  laugh.  '  The  amount,'  said  Wilde, 
'  would  scarcely  run  to  that ;  but  should  there  be  any- 
thing over,  I'll  buy  a  postage  stamp  and  write  an 
acknowledgment.'  " 

He  despaired  of  finding  any  publisher  to  print 
anything  that  he  might  write.  He  said  to  one  man 
who  had  advised  him  to  write  for  a  living  :  "  My  friend, 
you  do  not  know  the  world  as  well  as  I  do.  Some 
people  might  read  what  I  chose  to  write  out  of  morbid- 
mindedness,  but  I  don't  want  that.  I  wish  to  be  read 
for  art's  sake  and  not  for  my  notoriety." 

"  During  the  last  few  days  of  his  confinement  he 
was  subject  to  periodical  fits  of  melancholy.  He  was 
not  seen  to  smile.  He  expressed  great  anxiety  as  to 
what  was  being  said  of  him  in  the  newspapers. 

"  On  the  last  evening  of  his  stay  in  Reading  Gaol 
he  was  buoyant  and  happy.  He  knew  that  he  was  to 
leave  prison  that  night.  He  was  fetched  by  the 
Governor  and  the  Chief  Warder.  As  he  left  his  cell, 
Mr.  Wilde  turned  and  took  a  last  look,  then  bent  his 
head  and  followed  down  the  steps.  It  was  a  beautiful 
evening,  but  in  the  prison  it  was  getting  dark  and 
gloomy.  There  were  tears  shed  in  Reading  Gaol 
that  night  when  it  was  known  that  C.  3.  3.  had 
gone. 

"  He  was  taken  that  evening  in  a  closed  carriage 
to  a  little  wayside  station  a  few  miles  out  of  Reading, 
and  from  there  by  train  to  Paddington.  He  was  then 
conveyed  to  Wandsworth  Gaol,  whence  he  was  released 
on  the  following  morning.      He  travelled  from  Reading 


432  TWHNTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

to  Paddington  in  company  with  the  Chief  Warder,  but 
they  \Nerc  both  in  })lain  clothes  and  were  not  recojj^niscd. 
Outside  Readin*;'  Prison  the  following'  morning  a  crowd 
collected  to  satisfy  their  morbid  curiosity,  but  they 
were  destined  to  be  disappointed.  At  that  moment, 
no  doubt,  he  was  crossing  Wandsworth  Common  in 
the   company  of  his   friends." 

In  prisons,  in  despite  of  all  regulations,  there  are 
many  opportunities  for  conversation.  I  have  learned 
many  of  the  things  that  Oscar  Wilde  said  to  his 
companions. 

Andre  Gide  repeats  in  the  article  referred  to  above 
a  story  that  Oscar  Wilde  told  him  of  how  he  came 
to  speak  first  with  a  prisoner  in  Reading  Gaol  and 
of  what  resulted  from  it. 

"  Those  who  are  in  prison  for  the  first  time,"  he 
said,  "  recognise  one  another  by  the  fact  that  they  are 
unable  to  converse  without  moving  their  lips.  ...  I 
had  been  locked  up  for  six  weeks,  and  during  that 
time  I  had  not  spoken  a  word  to  a  single  soul — to  a 
single  soul.  One  evening  we  were  marching  one 
behind  the  other  during  the  exercise  hour,  and  suddenly 
behind  me  I  heard  my  name  spoken  ;  it  was  the 
prisoner  who  was  behind  me  who  was  saying,  '  Oscar 
Wilde,  I  pity  you,  for  you  must  suffer  more  than  we 
do.'  I  had  to  make  an  enormous  effort  not  to  be 
observed  (I  thought  that  I  was  going  to  faint),  and  I 
said  without  turning  round,  '  No,  my  friend,  we  all 
suffer  alike.'  And  that  day  I  had  no  longer  the  faintest 
desire  to  kill  myself. 

"  We  spoke  thus  together  for  several  days  running, 
I    got    to    know    his    name   and    what    his    trade    was. 

His    name    was    P ;    he    was    an    excellent  fellow  ! 

But  I  had  not  yet  learned  how  to  talk  without  moving 


C.    3.   3.   AND   A.   4.   8.  433 

my  lips,  and  one  evening,  *  C.  3.  3. '  (it  was  I  who  was 
C.  3.  3.)  '  and  A.  4.  8.,  leave  the  ranks.'  We  left  the 
ranks,  and  the  warder  said,  *  You  will  have  to  go  before 
the  Governor,'  And  as  pity  had  already  entered  into 
my  heart,  I  was  alarmed  only  for  my  companion, 
absolutely  on  his  account  alone.  For  myself,  I  was 
pleased  to  think  that  I  should  suffer  on  his  account. 
But  the  Governor  was  altogether    terrible.     He    made 

P- come  in  first ;  he   wished   to  question  us  apart — 

for  I  must  tell  you  that  the  punishment  is  not  the  same 
for  the  man  who  has  spoken  first  and  thus  began  the 
conversation,  as  for  him  who  has  answered.  The  punish- 
ment is  double  for  the  man  who  speaks  first ;  usually 
the  former  gets  fourteen  days'  cells,  and  the  latter  only 
seven.     So  the  Governor  wished   to  know  which  of  us 

had  spoken  to  the  other  first.     And,  naturally,   P , 

who  was  a  very  good  fellow,  said  that  it  was  he.  And 
when,  afterwards,  the  Governor  had  me  brought  in  and 
questioned  me,  naturally  I  said  that  it  was  I  who  had 
spoken  first.  Then  the  Governor  turned  very  red 
because   he  could  not   follow   us   in  his   understanding. 

'  But    P says   also    that    it    was   he  who  began  to 

talk.  I  cannot  make  it  out — I  cannot  make  it  out.' 
Can  you  imagine  that  he  could  not  understand  ?  He  was 
much  perplexed  ;  he  said,  '  But  I  have  already  given 
him  a  fortnight  .  .  .'  Then  he  added,  '  Well,  if  that's 
the  way  you  have  settled  it,  I  shall  give  both  of  you 
a  fortnight.'  Was  it  not  extraordinary.-*  The  man  had 
no  imagination  of  any  kind." 

Gide  remarks  here,  "Wilde  was  greatly  amused 
with  what  he  was  saying  :  he  laughed ;  he  was  happy 
to  be  telling   me  this  story." 

"And  naturally,"  continued  Oscar  Wilde,  "after  the 
fortnight,  we  had  a  greater  wish    than  ever  to  talk    to 

28 


434  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

c.ich  other.  You  cannot  think  how  sweet  it  was  to 
feel  that  we  were  suffering  one  for  the  other.  As  time 
went  on,  as  we  did  not  always  have  the  same  places  in 
the  ranks — as  time  went  on  1  was  able  to  converse  with 
every  one  of  the  other  prisoners  ;  to  every  one,  to  every 
one  of  them  !  I  got  to, know  each  man's  name,  each  man's 
story,  anci  the  date  on  which  they  were  to  be  released. 
And  to  each  one  of  them  I  used  to  say,  "  As  soon  as  you 
get  out  of  prison,  the  first  thing  you  must  do  is  to  go  to 
the  post  office  ;  there  will  be  a  letter  there  for  you  with 
money  in  it." 

A  man  had  confessed  to  him  that  his  religrious  belief 
was  wavering,  and  Wilde  said  to  him,  "  People  fashion 
their  God  after  their  own  understanding.  They  make 
their  God  first  and  worship  Him  afterwards.  I  should 
advise  you,  however,  to  postpone  coming  to  any  con- 
clusion at  present.  And  if  you  should  happen  to  die  in 
the  meantime,  you  will  stand  a  much  better  chance, 
should  a  future  exist,  than  some  of  those  braying 
parsons." 

On  another  occasion  a  man  had  told  him  that  he  was 
afraid  of  ghosts  and  that  he  felt  sure  that  ghosts 
must  be  found  round  the  crime-stained  walls  of  a  prison. 
"  Not  necessarily  so,"  he  replied.  "  You  see,  prisons 
have  no  family  traditions  to  keep  up.  You  want  to  go  to 
some  castle  to  see  ghosts,  where  the  ghost  is  handed  over 
from  generation  to  generation  with  the  family  jewels." 
Whenever  he  was  asked  for  advice  as  to  what  to  read  to 
form  the  mind  and  style,  he  used  to  repeat,  "  Read 
Carlyle."  ^ 

^  It  was  one  of  the  amiable  traits  of  his  character  that  he  was  ever 
ready  to  assist  those  who  came  to  him  for  advice.  He  took  pleasure  in 
counselling  young  writers.  The  following  is  one  of  the  many  letters 
which  he  wrote :  an  answer  to  a  youth  who  had  written  to  him,  sending 


A    LETTER   OF    ADVICE  435 

him  a   manuscript   to   read   and  asking  him  for  guidance  to  literary 
success.     The  letter  was  dated  from  Tite  Street : 

''Dear  , 


"  I  have  been  laid  up  with  a  severe  attack  of  asthma,  and  have  been 
unable  to  answer  your  letter  before  this.  I  return  you  your  MSS.,  as 
you  desire,  and  would  advise  you  to  prune  it  down  a  little  and  send  it 
to  either  Tivie  or  Longtnan's.  It  is  better  than  many  magazine 
articles,  though,  if  you  will  allow  me  to  say  so,  it  is  rather  belligerent 
in  tone. 

"  As  regards  your  prospects  in  literature,  believe  me  that  it  is 
impossible  to  live  by  literature.  By  journalism  a  man  may  make  an 
income,  but  rarely  by  pure  literary  work. 

"I  would  strongly  advise  you  to  try  and  make  some  profession, 
such  as  that  of  a  tutor,  the  basis  and  mainstay  of  your  life,  and  to  keep 
literature  for  your  finest,  rarest  moments.  The  best  work  in  literature 
is  always  done  by  those  who  do  not  depend  upon  it  for  their  daily 
bread,  and  the  highest  form  of  literature,  poetry,  brings  no  wealth  to  the 
singer.  For  producing  your  best  work  also  you  will  require  some 
leisure  and  freedom  from  sordid  care. 

"  It  is  always  a  difficult  thing  to  give  advice,  but  as  you  are  younger 
than  I  am,  I  venture  to  do  so.  Make  some  sacrifice  for  your  art,  and 
you  will  be  repaid ;  but  ask  of  Art  to  sacrifice  herself  for  you,  and  a 
bitter  disappointment  may  come  to  you.  I  hope  it  will  not,  but  there 
is  always  a  terrible  chance. 

"  With  your  education  you  should  have  no  difficulty  in  getting 
some  post  which  should  enable  you  to  live  without  anxiety,  and  to  keep 
for  literature  your  most  felicitous  moods.  To  attain  this  end,  you 
should  be  ready  to  give  up  some  of  your  natural  pride ;  but  loving 
literature  as  you  do,  I  cannot  think  that  you  would  not  do  so. 

"  Finally,  remember  that  London  is  full  of  young  men  working  for 
literary  success,  and  that  you  must  carve  your  way  to  fame. 

"  Laurels  don't  come  for  the  asking. 

"Yours, 

"Oscar  Wilde." 


CHAPTER   XXVI 

Why  Oscar  Wilde  returned  to  Former  Friends — His  Last  Years  in  Paris — 
"  Deaths  are  Apt  to  be  Tragic  " — Ernest  La  Jeunesse — His  Magnificent 
Essay  on  Oscar  Wilde — A  Picture  of  the  Poet  in  his  Last  Days— His 
Death  and  Funeral — My  First  Visit  to  his  Grave — His  Landlord's 
Story — Bagneux  revisited — The  Traffic  in  his  Name — Literary 
Forgeries. 

IT  was  stress  of  circumstance  which  drove  Oscar 
Wilde  to  return  to  that  companionship  which  had 
been  the  initial  cause  of  his  ruin.  When  he  first  came  to 
Berneval,  and  before  he  had  realized  how  entirely  the  world 
was  closed  against  him,  while  he  still  hoped  to  be  able  to 
win  a  livelihood  by  his  labour,  he  was  firm  in  the  resolution 
which  he  had  formed  in  prison,  to  avoid  the  society  of 
the  men  who  had  been  his  former  associates.  Speaking 
of  one  of  them  to  Andre  Gide,  he  said,  as  is  reported  in 
his  own  words  by  the  French  writer,  "  X.  is  writing  me 
terrible  letters  ;  he  says  that  he  cannot  understand  me — 
that  he  cannot  understand  that  I  am  not  indignant 
against  everybody — that  everybody  has  acted  odiously 
towards  me.  ...  No,  he  does  not  understand  me  ;  he 
can  no  longer  understand  me.  But  I  repeat  in  each 
letter  which  I  write  to  him,  we  cannot  follow  the  same 
path.  '  You  have  yours  ;  it  is  a  very  pleasant  one  ;  I 
have  my  own.'  His  path  is  the  path  of  Alcibiades;  mine 
is  now  that  of  Saint  Francois  d'Assise." 

The  time  came,  however,  when,  being  without  money, 
repulsed,  abandoned,  desolate,  he  could  no  longer  resist 

436 


WHY    RESOLUTION    FAILED  437 

entreaties  which  offered  to  him  companionship  in  the 
place  of  utter  loneHness,  friendship  in  the  place  of 
hostility,  homage  in  the  place  of  insult,  and  in  the 
place  of  impending  destitution  a  luxurious  and  elegant 
hospitality. 

Of  his  life  in  Paris  after  this  new-formed  association 
had  dissolved  itself  by  the  very  weariness  of  things, 
many  accounts  have  been  given  to  the  world.  The 
friends  who  precipitated  Wilde  into  the  abyss  endeavoured 
in 'writings  in  the  papers  to  persuade  themselves  and  the 
public  with  them  that  after  his  ruin  had  been  definitely 
consummated,  his  life  was  an  easy  one,  not  lacking  in 
happiness.  There  are  cited  as  attributes  to  this  felicity 
the  sympathy  of  certain  of  the  minor  French  writers,  the 
occasional  hospitality  of  casual  visitors  to  Paris,  and  the 
fact  that  he  never  had  less  to  spend  in  one  week  than 
a  sum  which,  laid  out  with  prudence  and  economy,  might 
suffice  any  orderly  man  to  provide  himself  in  Paris  with 
the  reasonable  necessaries  of  existence.  We  have  further 
been  told  that  though  "deaths  are  apt  to  be  tragic" 
(I  am  quoting  the  ipsissima  verba  of  one  writer),  "  he 
was  surrounded  by  friends  when  he  died."  The  same 
writer  adds,  "  And  his  funeral  was  not  cheap ;  I  happen 
to  have  paid  for  it  in  conjunction  with  another  friend  of 
his,  so  I   ought  to  know." 

As  for  my  own  observation  of  him  at  this  time,  my 
position  was  such  that  I  did  not  care  too  closely  to 
inquire  into  his.  I  was  quite  helpless,  I  could  have 
helped  in  no  way.  The  other  day  amongst  some  letters 
of  Ernest  Dowson's  which  were  offered  for  sale  in 
London,  I  came  across  one  which  reminded  me  that  on 
a  certain  day  in  that  summer  of  1899  we  had  been  one 
whole  day  without  bread.  I  could  not  have  joined 
him  in  a  cafd^  for  I  should  not   have  had  even  the  small 


438  TWENTY   YKARS    IN    PARIS 

sum  which  throws  open  to  the  passer-by  the  doors 
of  such  estabhshments.  From  what  Andre  Gide  relates 
in  the  article  to  which  I  have  already  referred,  there 
were  occasions  when  Oscar  Wilde  found  himself  in  the 
same  situation.  Gide  tells  us  that,  finding  Oscar  one 
day  in  a  cafi\  as  he  was  taking  leave  of  him,  the  poor 
man  drew  him  aside  and  said,  "  Listen.  I  must  tell 
you.      I   am  absolutely  without   resources." 

As  I  wrote  in  the  story  of  our  friendship,  "His  last 
years  were  supremely  unhappy.  Poor,  lonely,  aban- 
doned, he  had  little  company  but  of  those  who  hoped 
to  prey  upon  his  brain.  Towards  me  he  became  more 
and  more  distant  ;  the  verminous  parasites  that  clung 
to  him  fostered  his  wrong  idea  that,  sitting  in  judgment 
upon  him,  I  had  condemned  him.  In  melancholy  and 
solitary  peregrinations  on  the  boulevards,  which  fifteen 
years  before  we  had  trod  so  triumphantly,  we  sometimes 
passed  each  other  in  silence,  with  only  a  faint  wave 
of  the  hand — like  two  wrecked  ships  that  pass  in  the 
night — 

.  .  .  Like  two  doomed  ships  that  pass  in  storm 
We  had  crossed  each  other's  way ; 
But  we  made  no  sign,  we  said  no  word, 
We  had  no  word  to  say.  ..." 

The  most  valuable  account  of  his  last  years  which 
exists  is  an  article  written  by  Ernest  La  Jeunesse  in 
the  Revue  Bla^tche.  Ernest  La  Jeunesse  is  the  name 
in  letters  of  an  Israelite  genius  called  Cohen-Cahen. 
This  young  man  sprang  into  fame  with  the  first  book 
which  he  published.  He  was  at  the  time  literary 
secretary  to  Anatole  France.  He  is  one  of  the  most 
admirable  writers  that  France  possesses.  He  has  the 
cultus  of  literary  style.  He  is  an  artist  of  that  rare 
and  delicate  fibre  which  one  sometimes  finds  among  men 


ERNEST    LA   JEUNESSE  439 

of  J  his  race.  To  devote  himself  to  art  he  prefers  to 
undergo  privation.  I  heard  him  once  say  to  a  man, 
"You,  you  write  des  cochonneries.  I,  in  order  to 
create  literature,  I  starve."  The  writer  so  apostrophized 
revenged  himself  afterwards  by  telling  me  that  Ernest 
La  Jeunesse  had  no  other  employment  in  journalism 
than  to  write  about  the  Academy.  "  It  comes  to  this," 
he  added,  "  that  an  Academician  has  to  die,  if  Ernest 
La  Jeunesse  is  to  have  a  dinner."  La  Jeunesse's  article 
on  Oscar  is  a  pure  gem  of  literature.  It  might  be 
commended  to  the  perusal  even  of  those  who  take  no 
interest  in  its  subject-matter.  It  demonstrates  what 
moving  effects  the  literary  artist  can  produce  by  mere 
puissancy  of  style.  I  know  no  piece  of  modern  French 
prose  which  is  worthy  to  stand  by  its  side.  It  is 
in  its  way  the  best  monument  that  has  yet  been 
raised  to  the  memory  of  the  great  man  whose  agony 
it  describes. 

Here  is,  in  his  own  words,  the  picture  which  he 
paints  of  Oscar  Wilde  after  his  return  to  Paris  from 
Italy  : 

"  Ses  paupieres  lourdes  s'appesantissaient  sur  des 
visions  cheres — ses  succes.  Il  marchait  a  petits  pas  pour 
se  mieux  rappeler ;  il  aimait  la  solitude  oii  on  le  laissait 
pour  etre  plus  avec  celui  qu'il  avait  ete.  .  .  } 

"  Tout,  dans  sa  face,  avait  le  pli  des  larmes.  Les 
yeux  semblaient  des  ravines  creusees  d'un  pleur  pale, 
la  bouche  a  peine  sanglante,  epaisse  comme  un  sanglot 
et  un  caillot  meles,  le  menton   douloureux  se  suivaient, 

^  *'  His  heavy  eyelids  drooped  beneath  the  weight  of  visions  that 
were  dear  to  him — the  visions  of  his  former  triumphs.  He  walked 
with  little  steps,  so  as  to  allow  his  memory  a  freer  play ;  he  loved  the 
solitude  to  which  the  world  abandoned  him,  for  he  found  himself 
there  in  the  company  of  the  man  he  had  been." 


L 


440  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

s'assemblaicnt  sous  les  cheveux  descsperes,  dans  cette 
bouffissure  de  chairs  qui  accompagne  Ics  crises  [sans 
tin   d'cftroi  ct  de    navrcment.   .   .   .' 

The  French  writer  lays  stress  on  the  poor  man's 
impotence  for  all  creative  work  : 

"  Fantome  ballonnt^,  caricature  enorme  ...  II  voulait 
a  la  fois  se  bercer  et  se  reveiller,  se  convaincre  qu'il 
pensait  toujours,  qu'il  savait  encore.  II  savait  tout  .  .  . 
Mais  il  lui  manquait  pour  les  ecrire  la  table  d'or  de 
Seneque — et  la  sienne."  ■ 

La  Jeunesse  refers  to  that  passing  acquaintance 
between  Oscar  Wilde  and  Major  Esterhazy  which  gave 
rise  to  some  malevolent  comment  in  London,  where 
W^ilde  was  accused  of  taking  part  on  that  side  of  the 
Dreyfus  affair  which  was  not  popular  in  England. 
The  facts  of  the  case  were  simply  that  Major  Esterhazy 
was  introduced  to  Oscar  Wilde  in  a  bar  by  an  English 
journalist  called  Strong,  and  that  the  two  were  after- 
wards occasionally  in  each  others'  society,  either  in 
this  bar  or  at  a  riverside  resort  called  Nogent-sur- 
Marne.  It  should  not  be  necessary  to  say  that  Oscar 
Wilde  took  no  part  in  any  agitation  against  Captain 
Dreyfus.     His  sympathies  would  have  been  on  the  side 

^  "  His  face  was  all  one  furrow,  such  as  is  ploughed  by  tears.  His 
eyes  were  as  the  beds  of  rivers,  hollowed  out  by  torrents  of  pale 
tears.  The  mouth,  well-nigh  bloodless,  and  bulky,  as  if  a  sob  and  a 
clot  had  been  kneaded  together  from  which  to  mould  it,  joining  itself 
to  the  dolorous  chin,  lay  together  with  it  under  the  mass  of  his  woe- 
begone hair ;  in  that  puffy  and  bloated  flesh  which  always  goes  with 
unending  transports  of  alarm  and  sorrow." 

2  "  A  swollen  phantom,  an  enormous  caricature.  .  .  .  He  wished  at 
one  and  the  same  time  to  lull  himself  to  sleep,  to  rouse  himself  to 
action,  to  convince  himself  that  he  still  could  think,  that  his  knowledge 
had  not  left  him.  There  was  nothing  that  he  did  not  know.  .  .  .  But 
to  write  these  things  down  there  were  wanting  to  him  Seneca's  golden 
table — and  his  own." 


HIS  ACQUAINTANCE  WITH  ESTERHAZY  441 

of  the  man  who  had  suffered  ;  and  as  to  anti-Semitism, 
he  described  it  as  both  vulgar  and  ungrateful.  "  The 
Jews,"  he  used  to  say,  "  are  the  only  people  who  lend 
money."  His  relations  with  the  Commandant  were  in 
any  case  of  short  duration.  After  the  transactions  in 
London  between  Esterhazy  and  Rowland  Strong  and 
their  quarrel  over  the  sale  of  some  documents  to  the 
Observer^  all  dealings  between  the  three  ceased. 

La  Jeunesse  declares  that  Wilde  remained  well 
dressed  to  the  end :  "  II  resta  jusqu'au  dernier  jour  elegant 
de  complet  et  confortable."  This  refutes  the  story  which 
describes  Wilde  as  creeping  about  in  ragged  clothes. 
At  the  same  time  Gide  relates  that  on  the  occasion 
when  he  met  him  in  the  cafd  where  he  spoke  of  his 
destitute  state,  his  appearance  had  become  shabby. 
"  His  hat  was  no  longer  so  shining ;  his  collar  was 
of  the  same  shape  as  usual,  but  was  no  longer  so  clean  ; 
the  wristbands  of  his  frockcoat  were  slightly  frayed." 
Jean  Joseph-Renaud  relates  that  he  met  him  once  in 
a  bar  on  the  Boulevard  des  Italiens  in  a  lamentable 
state  of  shabbiness.  For  my  part,  I  may  say  that  I 
never  noticed  his  dress.  It  was  his  eyes,  his  forehead, 
that  I  used  to  look  at.  After  his  death,  amongst  some 
papers  which  his  landlord  at  the  Hotel  d' Alsace  showed 
me,  was  a  receipted  bill  from  a  minor  English  firm  of 
tailors  in  Paris,  referring  to  two  suits  which  had  cost 
seventy  francs  each.  As  tailor's  charges  go  in  Paris, 
a  pathetic  document  to  be  found  among  the  papers 
of  one  who  had  been  the  Beau  Brummel  of  his  day 
in   London. 

Here  is  a  magnificent  passage  from  Ernest  la 
Jeunesse's  article  describing  Oscar  Wilde  in  the  days 
before  his  last  illness  : 

"II   nous   faudrait   ici   des   mots   se  precipitant,   une 


442  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

fuite  d'espoirs,  cic  verbc,  de  sourires,  une  chute  frenetique 
de  phrases,  d'onomatopees  dans  une  monotonie  d'existence 
atroce  et  momifiee  pour  montrer  le  poete  qui  s'eteint,  qui 
ne  se  resigne  pas  mais  qui  se  livre  et  qui  craint  la  mort 
au  jour  le  jour,  pour  les  hommes — en  I'appelant  degal  a 
egal  en  sa  chambre  etroite  d'un  hotel  gris.  II  a  ete 
^  la  campagne  et  en  Italie,  il  veut  I'Espagne,  il  veut 
retourner  au  bord  de  la  Mediterranee :  il  n'a  que  Paris, 
Paris  ferme  a  mesure,  Paris  qui  ne  lui  oftre  plus  que  des 
trous  ou  boire.  un  Paris  sourd,  un  Paris  affame,  hatif, 
congestionne  ici,  pale  la,  une  ville  sans  eternite  et  sans 
mythe.  Chaque  jour  lui  apporte  des  souffrances  :  il  n'a 
plus  ni  cour  ni  vrai  ami,  il  tombe  dans  la  pire  neuras- 
thenie.  La  gene  le  harcele  :  la  pension  de  dix  francs 
par  jour  que  lui  sert  la  famille  ne  s'augmente  plus 
d'avances  d'editeurs  :  il  lui  faut  travailler,  ecrire  les  pieces 
qu'il  a  signees,  par  traite, — et  il  lui  est  impossible  de 
se  lever  avant  trois  heures  de  I'apres-midi.  II  ne  s'aigrit 
pas,  il  s'acheve  :  il  s'alite  un  jour  sous  ce  pretexte  que, 
dans  un  restaurant,  des  moules  I'ont  empoisonne :  il  ne 
se  releve  plus  que  mauvaisement,  avec  une  arriere- 
pensee  de  mort  dont  il  mourra.  II  conte  alors  toutes 
ses  histoires  a  la  fois :  c'est  I'amer  et  eblouissant  bouquet 
d'un  feu  d'artifice  surhumain.  Ceux  qui  I'ont  entendu 
au  terme  de  sa  vie  devider  I'echeveau  des  ors  et  des 
pierreries  tisses,  des  fortes  subtilites,  de  I'invention 
psychique  et  fantasque  dont  il  devait  coudre  et  peindre 
la  tapisserie  de  ses  drames  et  de  ses  poemes  futurs,  ceux 
qui  I'ont  vu  nonchalamment  et  fierement  tenir  tete  au 
neant  et  tousser  ou  rire  ses  dernieres  phrases,  garderont 
le  souvenir  d'un  spectacle  tragique  et  hautain,  d'un  damne 
impassible  qui  ne  veut  pas  perir  tout  entier."  ^ 

^  "  We  should  need  here  words  which  rush  forth  in  torrents,  a  head- 
long stampede  of  hopes,  of  intonations,  of  smiles,  a  frenzied  downpour 


OSCAR   WILDE'S    LAST    DAYS         443 

He  took  a  great  delight  in  the  Exhibition.  He  spent 
most  of  his  last  days  there.  "  He  was  building  anew 
his  own  palace  in  the  midst  of  all  those  palaces." 

This  is  the  way  in  which  that  wonderful  magician  of 
style,  Ernest  la  Jeunesse,  describes  Oscar  Wilde's  funeral : 

"  Mais  voila  bien  des  details  :  finissons-en.  Treize 
personnes  qui,  en  un  dortoir  de  banlieue,  se  decouvrent 
devant  un  cercueil  tire  d'un  numero  treize,  un  corbillard 

of  phrases,  of  onomatopseic  words  gathered  in  the  monotony  of  a 
wretched  and  mummified  existence,  to  show  the  poet  as  he  dies  away, 
who  is  not  resigned  and  yet  abandons  himself,  who  fears  death  day  by 
day  amongst  his  fellow  men,  but  who  in  the  narrow  room  of  his  gloomy 
inn  calls  for  it,  equal  to  equal.  He  has  been  into  the  country  and 
to  Italy,  he  longs  for  Spain,  he  wishes  to  return  to  the  shores  of  the 
Mediterranean  :  all  that  he  can  have  is  Paris,  a  Paris  which  shuts  door 
after  door  against  him,  a  Paris  which  has  no  longer  more  to  offer  him 
than  holes  into  which  he  may  creep  to  drink,  a  Paris  which  is  deaf, 
a  famished,  spasmodic  Paris,  flushed  here,  there  pale,  a  city  without 
eternity  and  with  no  myth.  Each  day  brings  sufferings  with  it  for 
him  :  he  has  no  longer  either  a  court  or  a  true  friend,  he  falls  into  the 
blackest  neurasthenia.  Money  troubles  harass  him  :  the  eight  shillings 
a  day  which  his  family  allows  him  are  no  longer  supplemented  by 
advances  from  publishers  :  he  ought  to  work,  to  write  the  plays  which 
by  signed  contracts  he  has  undertaken  to  write, — yet  he  finds  it 
impossible  to  leave  his  bed  before  three  o'clock  in  the  afternoon.  He 
does  not  become  embittered,  he  is  simply  dying  out.  One  day  he  takes 
to  his  bed  on  the  pretext  that  he  has  been  poisoned  by  eating  some 
mussels  in  a  restaurant.  When  he  rises  from  his  bed  again,  it  is  like 
one  who  has  made  a  bad  recovery.  He  is  haunted  with  a  foreboding 
of  death,  which  in  the  end  will  kill  him.  He  then  tells  all  his  stories 
in  one  breath  :  it  is  the  bitter  yet  dazzling  final  piece  of  a  display  of 
superhuman  fireworks.  Those  who,  at  the  end  of  his  life,  heard  him 
unravel  the  skein  of  gold  and  jewelled  threads,  the  strong  subtleties, 
the  psychic  and  fantastic  inventions  with  which  he  proposed  to  sew  and 
embroider  the  tapestry  of  the  plays  and  poems  which  he  was  going  to 
write,  those  who  saw  him  proud  and  indifferent,  affronting  extinction, 
and  coughing  or  laughing  out  his  ultimate  phrasings,  will  keep  the 
remembrance  of  a  sight  at  once  tragic  and  lofty,  the  (sight  of  a  man 
damned  yet  impassive,  who  refuses  to  perish  altogether." 


I 


444  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

boiteux  k  peine  6toile  d'argent  sale,  deux  landaus  de 
duel  en  guise  de  voitures  de  deuil,  une  couronne  de 
lauriers,  des  fleurs  hagardes,  une  ^glise,  sans  drap  mortu- 
aire,  qui  ne  sonne  point  a  la  mort  et  qui  n'ouvre  au 
cortege  qu'un  bas-cot^  ;  une  messe  basse  vide  de  musique, 
une  absoute  scandee  par  des  levres  anglaises  qui  font  du 
latin  liturgique  une  bouillie  d'Ecosse  non-conformiste,  le 
salut  magnihque  d'un  capitaine  de  la  garde  sur  la  place 
Saint-Germain-des-Pr^s,  trois  reporters  qui  comptent  les 
assistants  comme  a  lanthropom^trie,  c'est  la  I'adieu  de 
la  Terre  a  un  de  ses  enfants  qui  voulut  la  magnifier  et 
etendre  son  songe,  c'est  la  le  glas  tacite  d'une  vie  de 
phantasmes  et  de  superbeaute  revee,  c'est  le  pardon, 
c'est  la  recompense ;  c'est,  dans  un  matin  hypocrite  et 
qui  se  derobe,  I'aube  de  I'^ternite ! "  ^ 

During  all  this  year  I  had  been  away  from  Paris. 
It  was  not  until  1903  that  I  could  muster  up  the  courage 
to  go  and  visit  my  friend's  grave,  or  bear  to  listen  to 
the  details  of  his  end.     And,  even  then,  I  do  not  think 

^  "But  enough  of  details;  let  us  come  to  the  end.  Thirteen 
persons,  who,  in  a  suburban  dormitory,  uncover  their  heads  before 
a  coffin  which  is  brought  out  of  a  number  thirteen ;  a  limping  hearse, 
meagrely  starred  in  dirty  silver,  two  landaus,  such  as  are  used  by 
duelling  parties,  to  represent  mourning  coaches;  a  wreath  of  laurels, 
some  haggard  flowers ;  a  church,  where  no  mortuary  cloth  drapes  the 
porch,  where  no  bell  tolls  a  funeral  peal,  which  opens  to  the  procession 
an  only  aisle;  a  low  mass  without  music,  an  absolution  scanned  by 
English  lips,  which  make  of  the  Latin  liturgy  a  Nonconformist  porridge  ; 
the  magnificent  salute  given  by  a  captain  of  the  guards  on  the  square 
of  St.  Germain  des  Pr^s;  three  newspaper  reporters,  who  count  the 
people  present,  like  detectives  taking  stock  of  prisoners  in  a  prison 
yard — this  was  earth's  farewell  to  one  of  her  children  who  wished  to 
glorify  her  and  to  extend  the  region  of  her  dreams ;  this  was  the  silent 
knell  of  a  life  of  fantasies  and  dreams  of  supernatural  beauty ;  this  was 
the  pardon,  this  was  the  reward  :  this — in  the  light  of  that  fleeting  and 
ambiguous  morning — was  the  dawn  of  eternity  i " 


A   VISIT   TO    BAGNEUX  445 

that  I  could  have  borne  these  emotions  if  I  had  not  been 
accompanied.  But  there  were  two  friends  with  me  ;  and 
one  of  these  was  a  man  who  had  had  such  great  admira- 
tion for  the  poet's  work,  and  had  felt  such  great  pity  for 
the  man's  suffering,  that  he  had  written  to  him  at  the  time 
of  the  catastrophe  to  offer  him  half  his  large  fortune  for 
acceptance — in  a  letter  which,  as  it  was  left  unanswered, 
can  never  have  reached  its  destination. 

It  was  indeed  rather  to  pilot  these  two  men  that  I 
paid  my  first  visit  to  the  grave.  For  my  own  part,  my 
prompting  was  to  try  and  disbelieve  all  that  I  had 
heard ;  to  fancy  that  the  story  of  his  sufferings  and  death 
was  but  one  of  those  evil  dreams  with  which  the  fevered 
days  and  nights  of  my  long  illness  had  perpetually  been 
haunted ;  that  the  friend  of  my  youth  had  not  perished, 
but  far  away  from  me  walked  glorious  and  triumphant, 
as  I  had  known  him  in  the  distant  years.  It  was  to 
the  only  paper  in  London  {Reynolds  s  Newspaper)  which 
would  print  the  dead  man's  name  that,  after  my  return 
home,  I  wrote  an  account  of  what  I  had  seen  and  heard. 
It  touched  many  hearts,  and  from  all  parts  of  the  world  ^ 
letters  reached  me  saying  that  people  were  grateful  to 
be  shown  how  to  feel  sorrow  for  a  man  whom  till  then 
they  had  regarded  as  one  against  whom  every  heart  must 
be  closed.     The  following  is  what  I  wrote  : 

"The  irony  of  Fate  was  to  pursue  Oscar  Wilde  to 
the  very  end.  The  man  whose  genius,  whose  parts  and 
performances  so  fully  entitled  him  to  the  highest  of  those 
poor  honours  which  humanity  can  give  to  its  illustrious 
dead,  is  buried  there  where  his  admirers  may  almost 
look  for  him  in  vain. 

"He  lies  in  Bagneux. 

1  I  published  the  article  simultaneously  in  Berlin  in  Die  Nation. 
The  two  versions  were  reprinted  all  over  the  world. 


446  T\Vr.\TV   VI:ARS    in    PARIS 

"  He  should  be  amongst  poets  ;  he  is  surrounded  by 
the  petty  hourocois  of  the  Parisian  suburbs. 

"He  would  not  read  de  Maupassant  when  he  lived, 
for  he  took,  he  said,  no  interest  in  the  people  of  whom 
de  Maupassant  chose  to  write.  Fate  has  doomed  him  to 
their  companionship  for  ever. 

"  The  fosse  covinninc,  where  his  dust  would  have 
mingled  with  that  of  the  wanton,  the  pauper,  the  thief, 
with  the  dust  of  those  to  whom  his  large  heart  went  out, 
victims  like  himself  of  the  cruel  order  of  social  things, 
would  have  been  desired  by  him  rather,  could  he  have 
ordained  his  obsequies,  than  his  present  promiscuities. 

"  His  is  the  17th  grave  in  the  8th  row  of  the  15th 
division.  The  graveyard  is  immense  ;  it  presents  not 
one  of  those  features  which  one  associates  with  places 
where  poets  rest.  There  are  no  trees,  and  so  there  will 
be  no  birds  to  sing  his  lullaby.  The  '  lin,  Ian,  lone  of 
evening  bells  '  will  never  ripple  over  his  deserted  tomb. 

"  Bagneux  is  so  remote  and  can  only  be  reached 
with  so  much  difficulty  that  here,  indeed,  the  dead  die 
quick.  The  vast  plain  was  all  deserted,  save  where 
one  busy  widow,  with  brush  and  napkin,  was  tidying  her 
husband's  grave.  She  was  very  active,  dusting  here  and 
sweeping  there,  /a2sa7i^  son  petit  mdnage,  and  was  a  very 
pleasant  sight.  But  she  was  all  alone,  and  her  presence 
served  but  to  make  the  desolation  of  the  place  more 
evident. 

"  Bagneux  is  the  ultimate,  dim  Thule,  and  as  I  drove 
out  there  the  other  day  with  two  Englishmen,  whose 
admiration  for  the  dead  poet  had  brought  them  to  Paris 
for  this  very  pilgrimage,  I  could  not  but  recall  a  jest 
which  he  once  made  to  me — that  Passy,  where  I  was 
living,  was  a  place  so  distant  from  the  world  that  when 
cabmen  drove  one  there  they  kept  getting  down  to  ask 


THE    ROAD   TO    BAGNEUX  447 

for  something  on  account  of  X.)\&  pourboire.  One  passes 
through  Montrouge  and  out  by  the  Orleans  Gate  and 
then  across  a  vast  suburb,  le  Grand  Montrouge,  which 
at  night  must  ring  with  the  cries  of  folk  in  danger.  We 
stopped  at  many  florists  on  the  way,  for  my  friends  wanted 
to  buy  roses  for  the  grave.  '  He  has  told  us  himself,' 
said  one  of  them,  '  what  flowers  to  put  there — red  roses 
and  white  roses  ' — and  he  quoted  some  lines  from  the 
Ballad  of  Reading  Gaol.  But  there  were  no  roses  to  be 
had  anywhere,  and  at  the  last  shop  before  the  cemetery 
was  reached  white  lilac  was  bought  and  some  yellow 
flowers.  I  noticed  that  this  shop  was  at  the  corner  of 
the  Rue  Alphonse  Daudet,  and  all  that  Daudet  had  said 
about  him  rushed  back  upon  my  mind. 

"  We  searched  for  him  for  a  long  time,  for  though  the 
site  was  known  to  our  guide,  the  landlord  of  the  hotel 
where  he  died,  the  geography  of  these  places  changes 
with  startling  rapidity.  New  landmarks  are  ever  springing 
up  ;  the  old  landmarks  as  rapidly  disappear.  It  was  not 
until  a  chart  had  been  consulted  at  the  ofiice  of  the  gate 
that  we  found  him.  He  lies  next  to  a  woman  whose 
name  was  Bienfait.  The  gravestone  is  brown,  and  bears, 
beside  his  name  and  age,  a  verse  from  Job.  He  had 
laughed  long  in  life,  and  it  was  to  the  Job  of  tears  that 
one  had  to  turn  to  find  his  epitaph. 

"  The  grave  had  a  neglected  look  ;  weeds  covered 
the  valley  where  the  mound  had  been  engulfed.  Yet  a 
blue  flower,  weed  itself,  had  chosen  this  spot,  and  none 
other,  where  to  live  its  short,  unfragrant  life.  One  of 
the  Englishmen  dug  it  up,  and  will  plant  it  again  in 
England,  and  perhaps  the  little  blue  flower  will  be  sad 
and  die  for  Heimweh. 

"After  we  returned  to  the  hotel — the  Hotel  d'Alsace, 
in  the  Rue  des  Beaux-Arts — we  visited  the  room  where 


448  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

he  died,  a  small  bedroom  on  the  first  floor,  looking  out 
on  the  courtyard.  The  hanj^inos  of  the  bed,  the  window- 
curtains,  the  upholstery  of  the  furniture  were  of  the 
colour  of  the  lees  of  wine.  Behind  a  rickety  table  a 
maculated  couch  squatted  like  a  toad.  All  was  faded 
and  threadbare.  The  impression  was  that  of  poverty 
masquerading  at  comfort.  Chattcrton's  garret  in  Brook 
Street  must  have  presented  a  sight  less  poignant. 

"  '  There  he  lay,'  said  the  landlord,  pointing  to  the 
bed.  '  with  ice  on  his  head,  and  in  his  delirium  he  swore 
at  his  pain.  He  kept  raising  his  hands  to  his  head  to  try 
and  ease  his  torture.  The  doctors  said  that  they  ought 
to  cut  into  the  head,  but  that  there  was  no  sign  to  guide 
them  where  to  cut,  and  so  no  operation  could  be  tried. 
He  must  have  suffered  greatly,  for  he  swore  and  swore. 
And  there  he  died — in  my  arms.  It  was  two  o'clock  of 
the  afternoon.' 

"  The  man  spoke  in  short,  gasping  sentences,  under 
evident  emotion,  and  I  recalled  pointing  out  to  Wilde 
that  artists  have  ever  used  the  short  sentence  when  they 
have  described  some  tragic  thing.  It  is  like  the  words 
of  a  messenger  of  evil  tidings,  who  has  run  a  long  way 
to  tell  them,  and,  breathless,  can  find  but  gasping  words. 
So  Goethe  in  the  last  lines  of  the  Sorrows  of  Werther, 
and  so  Wilde  also  at  the  end  of  Dorian  Gray. 

**  We  heard  that  before  he  became  ill  of  his  final 
illness — the  meningitis  which  killed  him,  and  which  is 
only  the  scientific  name  for  the  *  broken  heart ' — he  had 
worked  hard.  What  he  wrote  was  given  to  others,  to 
be  published  as  their  own. 

"  '  He  used  to  work  at  nights,  all  night  long.  As 
a  rule  he  would  come  in  at  one  o'clock  in  the  morning 
and  sit  down  to  his  table,  and  in  the  morning  he  would 
show  me  what  he  had  written,  and  "  I   have  earned  a 


"A    HUNDRED    FRANCS  A    NIGHT"     449 

hundred  francs  to-night !  "  he  would  say.  And  he  seemed 
pleased  and  proud  to  think  that  he  had  earned  a  hundred 
francs  in  one  night.  But,'  continued  the  landlord, '  the  man 
who  employed  him  was  very  irregular  about  sending  him 
his  money,  and  this  used  to  vex  Monsieur  Wilde  very 
much.  He  was  always  inquiet  until  the  payment  came, 
and  used  to  rail  against  his  employer.  Towards  the  end 
it  became  very  difficult  for  him  to  write,  and  he  used  to 
whip  himself  up  with  cognac.  A  litre  bottle  would  hardly 
see  him  through  the  night.  And  he  ate  little,  and  he 
took  but  little  exercise.  He  used  to  sleep  till  noon,  and 
then  breakfast,  and  then  sleep  again  till  five  or  six  in  the 
evening.' 

*'  The  landlord  of  this  hotel  will  be  remembered 
hereafter.  He  was  very  good  to  the  poor  poet.  At 
first  he  had  been  suspicious,  and,  indeed,  had  forced  him 
to  leave  his  house,  his  bill  beijig  unpaid.  He  afterwards 
met  him  in  the  street,  and  heard  that  he  had  been  forced 
to  leave  his  new  hotel  also  because  he  could  not  pay,  and 
was  literally  without  a  shelter.  Thereupon  this  kindly 
man  bade  him  return  to  his  old  room,  in  God's  name  ; 
and,  more  than  this,  went  and  fetched  away  his  things 
from  the  hotel  where  they  were  being  detained,  and  paid 
the  bill.  It  was  a  bill  for  ^5.  He  has  the  receipt 
still,  and  shows  it  with  some  pride.  When  Wilde  died 
he  was  heavily  in  this  man's  debt. 

"  One  of  my  friends  asked  the  landlord  if  he  had  any 
little  thing  that  had  belonged  to  the  poet  which  he  would 
care  to  sell  him  as  a  souvenir.  .  .  .  But  there  was  the 
ink-bottle  that  he  had  used — a  trumpery  little  china  thing, 
worth  a  few  pence  perhaps.  The  Englishman  gladly 
gave  a  louis  for  it. 

"  Of  many  evil  days  that  day  will  ever  be  remembered 
by  me  as  the  very  worst.     There  are  things  which  one 

29 


450  TWENTY    YEARS    IN    IWRIS 

slnniKl  noi  know  ;  there  aw  ihiiv's  which  one  oiisfht  not 
to  know.  Anil  the  punislmient  that  results  from  seeking 
out  the  knowledge  of  them,  bitter  as  it  is,  is  only  too  well 
deserved.  This  also  is  one  of  those  faults  which,  as 
Goethe  says,  avenge  themselves  on  earth." 

In  July  of  the  following  year  I  revisited  the  grave, 
and  once  more  wrote  and  published  my  narrative.  It 
appeared  in  the  same  journal.      I  was  again  accompanied. 

"  The  revolving  year  has  brought  with  it  again  the 
pious  duty  of  pilgrimage  to  a  remote  and  an  abandoned 
grave.  Abandoned  in  the  fact,  but  now  a  spot  on 
which  the  thoughts  of  many  thousand  people  in  many 
lands  recurrently,  and  with  ever-increasing  sadness,  fix 
themselves.  For  since  I  visited  Bagneux  churchyard 
in  the  summer  of  last  year,  the  force  of  the  man's 
irrepressible  genius  has  carried  his  name  north  and 
south  and  east  and  west,  and  the  lament  for  his  untimely 
end  has  wrung  a  thousand  hearts.  To  speak  of  one 
country  alone,  there  is  at  this  moment  in  Germany  a 
movement — a  '  Wilde-Bewegung  ' — for  the  study  of 
his  works,  the  magnitude  and  universality  of  which 
surprises  even  those  who,  from  a  sense  of  immanent 
justice,  first  set  it  afoot.  The  people  crowd  to  see  his 
plays,  the  theatres  of  the  Fatherland  ring  with  enthusi- 
astic applause  (of  which  the  echo,  alas !  falls  short  of 
Bagneux  graveyard),  his  books  are  snatched  with  eager 
hands  from  the  heaped-up  shelves  of  the  smiling 
publishers,  and  it  is  difficult  to  miss  seeing  in  the 
publications  of  any  one  week  in  Germany  some  eulogy 
of  the  work  he  did  or  some  lament  for  the  unspeakable 
tragedy  of  his   life  and   death. 

"  This  time,  also,  I  w^as  not  alone,  and  of  the  two 
men  who  accompanied  me  one  had  come  many  thousand 
miles  across  the  sea  with  little  other  purpose  of  pleasure 


A   PILGRIMAGE    TO    BAGNEUX         451 

or  of  profit  than  what  might  accrue  from  imperious  duty 
fulfilled,  an  act  of  justice  done.  With  the  other  man, 
a  day  or  two  previously,  I  had  undertaken  to  another 
exile's  tomb  another  pilgrimage,  and  as  we  looked  at 
the  grave  in  Bagneux  we  could  not  but  agree  that 
most  of  what  stood  in  Latin  on  the  marble  of  St. 
Germain's  might  with  equal  truth  have  been  written 
here  also  : 

Magnus  in  prosperis,  in  adversis  major. 

"  With  what  equal  truth  could  these  words  be  said 
of  Oscar  Wilde,  from  whose  lips  when  disaster  crushed 
him  down  never  a  complaint  arose  against  those  who 
had  encompassed  his  entire  destruction. 

Insignes  Aerumnas  dolendaque  nimiimi  fata. 

"  One  might  search  the  world's  history  through  for 
sorrows  more  remarkable  than  were  his,  for  a  fate  than 
his  more  entirely  to  be  deplored. 

"  It  would  have  been  a  hopeless  task  for  me,  guided 
by  memory  alone,  to  seek  out  the  grave  in  that  ever- 
shifting  landscape.  Since  a  year  ago  many  are  the 
leaseholders  of  these  lands,  for  whom  their  tenures  of 
the  tomb  could  not  be  renewed  by  poor  relations,  who 
have  been  ejected  from  their  silence  and  repose  and 
now  mingle  their  bones  in  the  heaped-up  ossuaries  of 
the  common  ditch.  In  every  avenue  of  the  hushful 
city  one  sees  placed  for  removal  by  the  dealers  in  odds 
and  ends,  wreaths  of  wire,  tombstones,  iron  railings, 
and  crosses,  which  shall  no  more  cast  the  promise  of 
their  shadows  upon  a  violated  grave. 

"If  you  would  lie  in  peace  in  Bagneux  graveyard 
until  the  loud  rdveille  of  the  Judgment  Trump  there 
must  be  paid  the  equivalent  of  £2 1    so    many  shillings 


452  TWKNTV   VF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

and  pence.  I'l^r  tliis  sum  there  is  granted  a  fee-simple 
to  eternity. 

"  I  betook  myself  accordin^dy  to  the  office,  where, 
behind  desks  and  counters,  sit,  amidst  large  ledgers, 
the  traffickers  in  sleep.  Here,  day  by  day,  is  issued 
the  list  of  those  who,  having  had  the  share  of  rest  for 
which  their  friends  have  paid,  receive  their  congd,  and 
in  default  of  further  payments  from  their  assigns  and 
heirs,  are  destined  to  the  rude  and  premature  awakening 
of  the  digger's  spade. 

"  '  We  have  no  man  of  that  name  here,'  said  the 
clerk  to  whom  I  had  addressed  myself,  '  but  there  is 
a  lady.  .  .  .' 

"  And  he  pointed  to  an  entry  in  the  ledger  for 
December,   1900. 

"His  error  arose  from  the  fact  that  he  could  not 
understand  the  Irish  forenames  that  follow  on  the 
Christian  name  which  a  kingly^  godfather — a  poet 
himself  also — bestowed  on  the  poet  child.  When  I 
had  pointed  this  out  to  him,  he  copied  on  to  a  printed 
form  the  viaticum  that  should  lead  me  to  the  spot 
from  which  my  regretful  thoughts  are  rarely  absent. 
Here    is   a    copy    of  this   viaticum.     It    may    serve  for 

^  King  Oscar  of  Sweden,  whom,  as  Duke  of  Ostergotland,  Wilde's 
parents  first  met  during  a  tour  in  Sweden.  It  was  some  time  before  the 
birth  of  Oscar,  and  the  extraordinary  impression  produced  upon  the  Irish 
poetess,  Speranza,  by  the  princely  poet  who  afterwards  became  King 
of  Sweden,  revealed  itself  in  the  resemblance  which  could  afterwards 
be  traced  between  the  son  who  was  born  later  and  his  kingly  godfather. 
In  a  biographical  work  about  himself  which  King  Oscar  sent  to  me, 
when  I  was  staying  in  Stockholm,  I  found,  among  other  portraits,  one 
of  them  as  a  young  man  which  reminds  one  very  much  of  Oscar  Wilde 
at  about  the  same  age.  The  book  in  question  is  Dr.  Josef  Linck's 
Konung  Oscar,  published  by  Adolf  Bonnier,  Stockholm,  and  the  portrait 
I  refer  to  appears  on  page  39  of  that  volume. 


THE    VIATICUM    TO   THE   GRAVE      453 

other  pilgrims  who  tread  the  maze  of  that  city  of  the 
dead. 


No.  5134  bis  Ad  F. 
Prefecture  De  La  Seine 

DIRECTION  REPUBLIQUE  FRAN(;:AISE 

des  liberte-egalite-fraternite 

AFFAIRES  MUNICIPALES  

CIMETIERE  PARISIEN 

6  Bureau  d! 

SITUATION  DE  SEPULTURE. 

Nom O.    Wilde 

Date  de  I'inhumation.    j  X,  igoo. 

I  J     Division 

8    Ligne 

No.  77 

Paris. — Imp.  Henon.  Formule  No.  28. 


"  '  This  gentleman,'  he  added,  as  he  closed  the 
powdery  register,  '  is  entitled  to  his  concession  until 
October,  1905.' 

"  In  Line  8  of  Division  15,  Grave  No.  17  could  be 
discerned  from  afar.  It  was  the  one  abandoned  of 
men.  It  was  the  one  that  was  flowerless,  save  where 
from  the  adjoining  grave  a  creeping  plant  throwing  out 
the  odorous  embraces  of  its  tiny  tendrils  had  begun  to 
mask  with  the  white  of  its  blossoms  and  the  green  of 
its  foliage  the  tawdry  wirework  of  the  metal  wreath — 
on  which  the  words,  *  Les  Employes  de  I'Hotel ' — 
which  hung  on  its  little  hook  to  the  left  of  the  memorial 
stone. 

"  For  it  is  not  fable.  We  know  it  is  truth. 
Between  the  flowers  that  are  set  in  the  earth  and  those 


454  TWFATV   VF.ARS    IN    PARIS 

in  whom  their  common  Creator  has  implanted  with  the 
love  of  beauty  the  love  of  (lowers  also,  there  is  a 
mysterious  bond  of  sympathy.  Human  contempt  and 
human  ingratitude  may  heap  the  accursed  poet's  tomb 
with  ortl  and  shard,  the  flowers  will  still  creep  and 
creep  towards  it, 

God's  kindly  earth 
Is  kindlier  than  men  know. 

When  the  wind  is  blowing  from  the  north  or  from  the 
south  down  the  aisle  of  tombs,  the  flowers  and  flowered 
bushes  on  graves  which  had  been  less  neglected 
never  let  it  pass  this  way  or  that  without  entrusting 
to  its  strong  pinions  some  coloured  and  scented  message 
for  the  poet.  But  many  of  these  perforce  go  astray. 
The  north  wind  is  impetuous  and  the  south  wind  fitful. 
So  I  fancy  the  creeping  plant  determined  to  do  better 
than  all  the  rest.  It  might  have  turned  to  the  right, 
but  there  was  a  poet's  grave  to  the  left,  and  so  to  the  left 
it  turned.  And  it  has  begun  by  masking  what  is  most 
ugly  there — the  metal  wreath  of  the  two  metal  wreaths 
which  by  their  isolation  and  their  uncomeliness  only 
impress  the  visitor  with  the  utter  forlornness  of  the 
place.  When  it  shall  have  transformed  into  coloured 
and  scented  strands  of  flowered  beauty  the  hideous 
metal  wires,  it  means  to  embower  the  gravestone,  and 
when  next  year  comes  we  shall  find  the  grave  lying 
cool   and  fragrant  under  a  canopy  of  green  and   white. 

"  Besides  the  two  metal  wreaths,  one  from  the 
servants  at  the  inn  where  he  died,  and  the  other, 
'  A  Mon  Locataire,'  from  a  kindly  landlord,  the  only 
tribute  of  affection  and  remembrance  that  marks  his 
grave  is  a  tiny  crown  of  immortelles,  its  immortality 
already  eaten  in  upon  by  the  gnawing  tooth  of  decay. 

"  My  two  companions  heaped  the  grave  with  flowers. 


A   WHITE    ROSE    AND   A    RED         1455 

Against  the  memorial  stone  they  heaped  an  armful 
of  arum  lilies,  gold  and  silver.  At  the  head  of  the 
grave — his  last  poem  has  told  his  friends  how  to  deck 
his  tomb — a  growing  red  rose  was  set,  and  there, 
where  the  great  heart  aches  no  more,  a  white  rose 
was  planted.  Elsewhere  red  roses  and  white  roses  in 
profusion,  so  that  the  grave  was  one  nosegay. 

"  This  is  the  inscription  on  the   memorial  stone  : 

OSCAR   WILDE. 
Oct.  I 6th,  1854  Nov.  30TH,  1900. 

Verbis  meis  addere  nihil  aude- 
bant  et  super  illos  stilla- 
bat  eloquium  meum. 

Job  XXIX.  22. 
R.I.P. 

'*  The  singularly  inept  translation  of  this  verse  from 
Job  in  the  English  Bible  reads  as  follows  :  '  After  my 
words  they  spake  not  again  ;  and  my  speech  dropped 
upon  them.' 

"  From  the  cemetery  we  returned  to  the  Hotel 
d' Alsace,  which  is  No.  13  of  the  Rue  des  Beaux-Arts, 
and  visited  the  room  where  he  died.^  It  is  furnished 
exactly  as  it  was  in  his  day,  and  with  the  same  articles 
of  furniture.  There  was  the  bed  on  which  he  died  with 
its  soiled  curtains  of  the  colour  of  lees  of  wine.  In 
front  of  the  squatting  sofa  stands  his  rickety  table.  That 
was  all  the  furniture  in  the  room.  Between  the  end  of 
the  bed  and  the  wall,  into  which  a  cupboard  was  let,  were 

^  It  is  the  intention  of  Oscar  Wilde's  executors  eventually  to 
remove  the  body  to  a  permanent  resting-place  in  one  of  the  cemeteries 
in  Paris.  Pere-Lachaise  will,  I  believe,  be  chosen.  In  any  case  the 
grave  in  Bagneux  would  have  to  be  disturbed,  as  the  concessions  in  that 
part  of  the  cemetery  are  only  temporary  ones. 


456  TWENTY    YEARS    IN    PARIS 

a  few  book-shelves.  The  fireplace  is  opposite  the  sofa, 
the  mantelpiece,  as  usual  in  French  apartments,  '  orne 
de  glaces ' — with  a  soiled  and  tawdry  mirror.  On  the 
mantelshelt  was  a  massive  clock  of  metal  and  marble,  the 
*  motif  being  a  crouching  lion. 

"  Of  the  property  which  the  poet  left  behind  him  in 
his  room  there  still  remain  in  the  hands  of  the  kindly 
landlord,  Monsieur  Dupoirricr,  two  large  trunks,  a  small 
paper  parcel,  and  a  chagreen  case.  In  the  leathern  case 
is  the  Privaz  syringe  with  which  in  the  last  months  of 
his  slow  agony  he  sought  the  Nepenthe  of  morphine. 

"  '  I  was  constantly  giving  him  injections,'  said 
Monsieur  Dupoirrier,  '  to  calm  him,  for  he  suft'ered 
dreadfully.' 

"It  appears  from  what  the  landlord  told  us  that 
hardly  a  week  passes  but  that  some  visitor  from  foreign 
lands  comes  to  the  hotel  and  asks  to  be  shown  the  room 
where  Oscar  Wilde  died.  One  gentleman — he  is  a 
wealthy  manufacturer  from  the  Midlands — always  insists 
on  occupying  this  room,  although  it  is  one  of  the  least 
cheerful  in  the  none  too  cheerful  house. 

"  '  It  has  become  quite  a  place  of  pilgrimage,'  says 
Monsieur  Dupoirrier. 

"  What  interested  us  most  of  all  was  what  the  two 
large  trunks  contained — the  books  which  he  had  collected 
during  his  stay  in  the  hotel. 

"  *  He  was  a  great  reader  was  Monsieur  Melmoth,' 
said  the  landlord.  '  One  rarely  saw  him  without  a 
volume  in  his  hand.  He  would  sit  for  hours  in  the 
yard  there  sipping  his  apdritif  and  reading.' 

"  Yet  the  books  showed  little  sign  of  usage.  Most  of 
them  were  uncut.  In  very  few  was  there  the  sign 
that  Oscar  Wilde  had  read  them  with  attention.  In  the 
old  days,  when  a  book  interested  him,  he  was  wont,  as 


THE    LAST    BOOKS    HE    READ  457 

he  read  it,  to  tear  off  a  corner  of  the  last  page  and 
roll  it  up  and  put  the  pellet  in  his  mouth,  as  though 
actually  tasting  the  quality  of  the  work.  Amongst  the 
three  hundred  odd  volumes  in  the  two  trunks  there  were 
many  French  novels,  a  Huysman  or  two,  and  of  the 
novels  those  that  seemed  to  have  been  most  read  were 
the  Cousine  Bette  and  Eiigdnie  Grandet.  I  remembered 
how,  twenty-one  years  ago,  in  a  hotel  not  very  far  from 
where  we  were  sitting,  he  had  talked  to  me  of  Balzac 
and  of  his  admiration  for  these  very  two  books.  Amongst 
the  English  books  were  Farrar's  Little  by  Little.,  and 
Hornung's  The  Rogues  March.  The  latter,  I  believe, 
had  been  bought  less  for  the  story  than  because  of  the 
scenes  of  prison  life  in  England  and  in  the  Colonies 
which  it  describes.  For — and  this  was  a  pathetic  cir- 
cumstance which  impressed  itself  deeply  upon  me — the 
pity  which  was  aroused  in  his  heart  for  the  victims  of  our 
hideous  English  prison  system,  with  all  its  coldly  calcu- 
lated and  cynical  cruelty,  whilst  he  was  a  prisoner  in 
Wandsworth  and  Reading  Gaols,  had  not  been  allowed  to 
die  out  after  he  had  regained  his  liberty.  He  seems  to 
have  collected  and  to  have  read  everything  that  he  could 
lay  his  hands  upon  which  treats  of  prison  life  in  England 
— books  and  magazines.  There  were  copies  of  the 
Nineteenth  Century,  with  disquisitions  by  Du  Cane,  and 
there  were  popular  sixpenny  magazines,  in  which  articles 
had  appeared  on  the  personal  experiences  of  convicts. 
And  amongst  the  books  that  had  been  read,  I  found  a 
copy  of  the  second  edition  of  Howard  on  Prisons,  with 
the  corner  of  page  51  turned  down,  where  the  noble 
John  pleads  for  '  more  humane  treatment  of  prisoners  in 
the  articles  of  food,  lodging,  and  the  like.'  Amidst  the 
forlorn  makeshifts  and  mysterious  expedients  of  his  dis- 
ordered life,  there  may  have  been  in  the  mind  of  this 


458  TWENTY   YRARS    IN    PARIS 

unhajipy  man  the  firm  purpose  that  in  the  days  to  come, 
when  his  voice  should  be  heard  again,  and  when  energy 
and  power  should  have  returned  to  him,  he  would  write 
another  plea  for  the  poor  wretches  whose  life  he  had 
shared  during  two  long  years  of  year-long  days. 

"  The  last  of  his  books  at  which  I  looked  was  a  copy 
in  two  volumes  of  a  French  translation  of  Tolstoy's 
Resurrection .  Of  this  only  the  first  sheet  or  two  had 
been  cut.  I  could  see  him  laying  it  aside  with  a  groan. 
In  Russia,  for  even  the  lowest  outcast,  there  is  the  hope 
of  a  rising  up  from  even  the  deepest  depths  of  social 
degradation.  In  England  the  man  who  falls,  falls  never 
to  rise  again.  He  would  know  that,  he  would  feel  that, 
and  the  volume  would  slip  from  his  loosened  fingers." 

I  have  only  a  few  words  to  add.  When  I  was 
writing  the  Story  of  an  Unhappy  Friendship  I  received 
from  a  publisher  in  Paris  a  letter  in  which  he  informed 
me  that  before  his  death  Oscar  Wilde  had  translated 
for  him  Ce  Qui  Ne  Meurt  Pas,  by  Barbey  d'Aurevilly, 
and  that  he  was  going  to  publish  the  translation  under 
Wilde's  name.  In  perfect  good  faith  I  was  thus 
deceived,  and  in  the  last  pages  of  my  book  depicted 
my  poor  friend  thus  employed  in  his  dingy  lodging. 
There  was  such  irony  in  the  circumstance  that  it  seemed 
to  me  that  it  could  not  be  otherwise  than  true.  When 
the  translation  was  published  and  had  come  into  my 
hands,  it  needed  but  the  perusal  of  the  opening  sentences 
to  show  me  that  I  had  been  duped.  The  imposture  has 
repeatedly  been  exposed  in  the  press,  but  the  book- 
sellers still  continue  to  advertise  this  clumsy  version 
from  some  proletarian  and  prurient  pen  as  the  work 
of  a  master  of  English  prose.  They  do  worse.  They 
include  amonofst  the  list  of  his  books  that  foolish  com- 
position    of    an    inadequately    birched    schoolboy,     The 


LITERARY   IMPOSTURES  459 

Priest  and  the  Acolyte,  which  was  written,  as  everybody 
who  was    at  Oxford   at    the    time    knows,   by  a  callow 

youth  named    B ,   anxious  to  display  of  what  great 

wickedness  he  was  capable.  He  is  now  a  clergyman 
of  the  Church  of  England,  and  we  will  hope  that  he 
finds  in  his  holy  books  a  justification  for  having  allowed 
another  man  to  bear  the  burthen  of  his  own  sins  for 
all  these  years. 

I  remember  that  when  I  was  told  that  Oscar  Wilde 
had  been  working  on  a  book  of  Barbey  d'Aurevilly's, 
I  felt  regret  that  he  had  [been  unable,  in  his  days 
of  abandonment  and  penury,  to  draw  inspiration  from 
the  example  of  that  great  man  in  his  last  days.  Barbey 
d'Aurevilly  used  to  say  that  his  books  were  read  by 
thirty  people  only.  Popular  success,  the  applause  of 
society,  were  altogether  denied  to  him.  This  was  never 
allowed  to  interfere  for  one  hour  with  his  steady  progress 
along  the  path  which  he  had  traced  out  for  himself. 
The  artist  who  is  truly  great  disregards  with  the  same 
serene  and  lofty  indifference  both  the  applause  and  con- 
temptuous silence  of  the  outer  world.  Oscar  Wilde 
should  have  remembered  the  lofty  example  of  George 
Meredith,  for  whom  his  admiration  as  an  artist  was 
unbounded.  In  a  letter  to  me  that  great  man,  inviting 
me  to  his  house,  warned  me  that  it  would  be  but  "an 
unsuccessful  novelist  living  in  a  poor  cottage  "  whom 
I  should  come  to  see.  It  is  said  of  Wilde  that  during 
that  illness,  of  which  La  Jeunesse  speaks  as  the  fore- 
runner of  his  fatal  malady,  he  spent  all  his  time  in 
reading  Balzac's  novels  for  the  hundredth  time,  defeating 
the  gloom  of  his  bedchamber,  and  celebrating  this  sym- 
posium with  his  immortal  patron  by  flooding  his  room 
with  the  light  of  many  and  superfluous  flambeaux.  In 
a  book  about  Balzac's  life  which  he  used  to  read  at  the 


46o  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

time  when  I  first  met  him,  he  had  made  himself  familiar 
with  the  story  of  the  sufferings,  penury,  and  humiliation 
which  throughout  all  his  career  the  French  author  had 
undergone.  It  had  taught  him  nothing.  In  this  book 
there  was  a  passage  describing  how  Balzac,  being  too 
poor  to  furnish  and  decorate  his  house  in  the  country 
near  Paris,  wrote  up  in  charcoal  on  the  bare,  unpapered 
walls,  "  Here,  tapestries  from  the  Gobelins  "  ;  over  the 
mantelpieces,  "  Here,  Venetian  glasses"  ;  on  the  naked 
boards  of  the  floor,  "  Here,  carpets  from  Persia  and  Tur- 
kestan." It  had  taught  him  nothing.  This  great  dramatist, 
who  by  his  Duchess  of  Padua,  at  least,  takes  his  place  in 
the  Elizabethan  pleiad  of  playwrights,  forgot  the  barren 
planks,  from  which  the  Elizabethan  masterpieces,  as 
from  a  jumping-board,  leaped  to  the  stars.  Accessories 
were  essential  to  him,  stage  properties,  accoutrements, 
lights,  effects — in  his  life  as  in  his  work.^  It  has  been 
said  of  the  great  Napoleon  that  it  was  not  for  strategical 
purposes  alone  that  he  always  began  his  battles  by 
thundering  discharges  of  artillery.  He  found  in  its 
reverberating  clamour  the  inspiriting  stimulant  of  his 
bellicose  frenzy.  His  genius  awoke  at  the  roar  of  the 
cannon.  To  Oscar  Wilde  applause  was  as  necessary 
as  to  Napoleon  the  bellow  of  war.  But  the  dramatist 
needed  his  encouragement  by  anticipation,  before  the 
medley  was  engaged,  before  issue  had  been  joined, 
drew  bills  for  discount  on  a  bankrupt  credit,  and  wrote 
his  "  Vos  Plaudite  "  as  the  initial  word  of  dramas  never 
to  be  written. 

^  And  so,  too,  were  they  necessary  to  Barbey  d'Aurevilly^  whom  he 
so  admired.  But  Barbey  contented  himself  with  a-  cloak  of  red  samite, 
which  he  wore  when  he  was  writing,  and  a  kind  of  throne  on  which  he 
seated  himself  when  receiving  visitors  in  his  poor  lodgings  in  Mont- 
martre.     Imagination  supplied  the  rest. 


"TO  UNDERSTAND  HIS  CHARACTER"     461 

Some  critics  of  my  book  have  reproached  me  that 
I  did  not  help  them  to  understand  his  character.  These 
must  be  of  that  critical  calibre  of  which,  writing  to  me 
in  reference  to  some  reviews  of  my  book,  a  great  English 
novelist  said,  "  It  is  marvellous  to  me,  this  extraordinary 
ignorance,  this  so  general  ignorance,  of  the  simplest 
psychological  processes,  on  the  part  of  English  writers. 
Never,  into  the  pudding  of  their  brains,  can  one  drive 
the  difference  between  subjective  and  objective." 

But  apart  from  that,  who  was  I  to  venture  to  fathom 
the  mysteries  of  that  most  complex  soul  ?  What  more 
could  I  presume  to  do  than  to  paint  \\\vs\  grosso  mode 
in  a  few  of  his  simpler  incarnations  ?  One  knew  him, 
one  saw  him  generous  and  good-hearted,  childlike  in 
simplicity  and  egotism,  self-indulgent  yet  delighting  in 
the  happiness  of  others,  exuberant  in  vitality,  filled  with 
enthusiasms,  but  subduino;  them.  His  aberrations,  if 
admitted,  still  seemed  incredible  to  those  who  had 
admired  the  singular  purity  of  his  words,  the  extreme 
reserve  and  prudence  of  his  conduct  in  his  saner 
moments. 

I  think  that  the  man  who  got  closest  to  the  truth 
in  his  reading  of  Wilde's  character  was  the  author 
of  the  review  of  De  Profimdis  which  appeared  in  the 
Times,  when  he  refers  to  his  assumption  of  characteristics 
and  qualities  which  were  not  his  own,  which  indeed 
were  alien  to  his  true  nature.  And  I  think  that  one 
great  mistake  which  Oscar  Wilde  made  in  life  was  to 
profess  knowledge  on  subjects  of  which  he  had  been 
too  indolent  to  study  the  technique.  There  are  certain 
things  which  not  the  intuition  of  the  greatest  genius 
who  ever  lived  can  impart.  One  has  even  to  go  to 
school  and  start  at  A  B  C  under  the  shadow  of  the  rod. 
There   was    nothing  which  he  could    not   have  done  if 


462  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

he  had  cared  to  master  essential  rules.  Feelinp^  that 
he  might  have  attained,  hat!  he  chosen  to  do  so,  to 
almost  universal  knowledj^e,  he  allowed  himself  to 
assume  it.  He  wrote  and  spoke  on  many  subjects 
on  which  he  was  not  qualified  to  write  or  speak — 
not  because  the  profound  comprehension  of  them  was 
beyond  his  reach,  but  because  he  had  neglected 
the  preliminaries  essential  to  this  comprehension. 
I  believe  that  this  was  the  reason  why  in  Paris  he 
never  enjoyed  that  admitted  mastership  which  was  his 
in  England.  The  French  do  not  believe  in  accom- 
plishment by  sheer  force  of  intuition.  They  train  their 
future  masters  of  the  arts.  They  insist  upon  technical 
training  for  even  the  rarest  genius.  They  send  Talma, 
Rachel,  Sarah  Bernhardt,  Coquelin,  Mounet-Sully  to 
school.  They  have  the  Beaux-Arts  and  Rome  for  their 
painters  and  sculptors,  and  Rome  and  the  Conservatoire 
for  their  musicians  and  composers. 

His  works  give  but  a  faint  echo  of  his  genius. 
"  II  passa  sa  vie  a  se  parler."  They  remind  those  who 
had  the  privilege  of  knowing  him  as  dimly  of  his 
soul-stirring  utterances  as  do  his  published  portraits 
recall   his  great  personal  beauty. 


CHAPTER  XXVII 

Emile  Zola  and  Oscar  Wilde — Zola's  Extreme  Reserve— A  Few  Facts  of 
Literary    History — The    Pro-Zola    Campaign — Vizetelly's    Naive    Ad- 

1  mission— Zola  asks  Advice  about  going  to  London — "Sic  Vos  non 
Vobis"— The  Dreyfus  Affair— The  Story  of  an  Intei-view— The  Zola 
Trial — His  Resentment  against  me— Our  Final  Meeting — My  Col- 
laboration with  Daudet— "  My  First  Voyage" — Two  Strange  Callers — 
How  we  Parted— At  Daudet's  Door— The  End. 

IT  was  particularly  impressed  upon  me  with  what 
suspicion  the  artistic  worker  in  France  looks  upon 
the  man  who,  whilst  leading  the  indolent  and  luxurious 
life  of  a  fashionable  dandy,  still  claims  to  rank  as  a  creative 
artist,  when,  in  1892,  I  took  Oscar  Wilde  to  Zola's 
house  and  introduced  him  to  the  great  novelist/  Another 
English  gentleman  of  high  social  standing  accompanied 
us,  wishing  also  to  be  presented  to  Zola.  At  that  time 
Zola  was  anxious  to  conciliate  public  opinion  in  England  ; 
and  beyond  that,  he  and  I  were  then  upon  such  excellent 
terms  that  the  mere  fact  that  I  had  brought  a  visitor  to 
his  house  would  have  sufficed  to  ensure  for  him  at  least 
a  courteous  welcome.  From  the  very  first  moment, 
however,  when  they  met,  Zola  evinced  his  dislike  for, 
and  distrust  of,  Wilde.  His  face  assumed  a  half-puzzled, 
a  half-suspicious  air,  as  though  he  were  in  doubt  whether 

^  In  a  book  of  Confessions,  published  last  year  in  London,  it  was 
stated  that  Oscar  Wilde  had  always  refused  to  make  the  acquaintance  of 
Zola  on  the  ground  that  he  disapproved  of  the  immorality  of  his  books. 
This  statement  was  pure  invention. 

463 


464  TWKNTV   Yl'ARS    IN    PARIS 

some  practical  joke  were  not  being  played  upon  him.' 
He  showed  all  those  signs  of  extreme  nervousness  which 
were  to  be  observed  in  him  when  social  observance  was 
putting  constraint  upon  him.  I  never  saw  him  wag  his 
foot  more  vigorously  than  on  that  occasion,  and  during 
the  whole  interview  I  was  in  fear  that  at  any  moment  he 
might  bring  it  to  a  close  with  that  hrusqiierie  which  he 
could  sometimes  assume  towards  visitors  who  were  not 
welcome  to  him. 

W^hen  we  had  got  outside,  into  the  Rue  de  Bruxelles, 
I  said  to  Oscar,  "  I  have  just  witnessed  the  first  meeting 
between  the  ant  and  the  cicada  of  La  Fontaine's  fable, 
and  have  realized  the  scene  which  is  only  indicated  in  the 
subsequent  conversation  between  the  two."  Alas !  the 
parallel  was  to  be  carried  out  to  the  end.  Wintry  days 
were  to  come  upon  the  singing  cicada,  and  the  ant  was 
to  refuse  its  sympathy  here  also.  To  be  quite  exact,  I 
am  not  certain  that  it  was  because  of  utter  want  of  sym- 
pathy for  Wilde  that  Zola,  with  a  certain  brutality  of 
expression,  refused  to  sign  the  petition  to  the  Queen 
which  was  got  up  by  some  young  men  of  letters  in  Paris 
to  pray  for  the  release  of  the  prisoner.  It  was  one  of 
Zola's  rules  of  conduct  not  to  interfere  in  such  matters, 
as  though  he  grudged  to  others  the  benefits  of  that 
influence  which  he  had  acquired  with  such  difficulties  for 

^  Oscar  Wilde  bore  no  resentment  to  Zola  for  the  coldness  of  the 
reception  accorded  to  him  on  this  occasion,  and  though  Zola's  work 
appealed  in  no  way  to  his  artistic  or  critical  senses,  he  was  always  ready 
to  defend  him  against  English  public  opinion  as  it  was  then.  I  have 
the  record  of  one  of  his  remarks  in  Reading  Gaol.  "  I  once  said  to 
him,"  my  informant  tells  me,  "  that  it  was  a  pity  that  there  was  no  English 
Zola."  He  said,  "The  English  people  are  too  hypocritical  to  tolerate 
a  Zola."  The  conversation  then  drifted  to  women  writers,  for  whom 
he  expressed  contempt,  because  they  never,  he  said,  wrote  any 
masterpieces." 


ZOLA'S   WANT   OF   ALTRUISM         465 

himself.  It  may  be  remembered  that  on  a  previous  occa- 
sion he  had  refused,  though  not  with  hostile  remarks,  to 
associate  himself  with  a  movement  for  the  release  of  the 
anarchist  writer,  Jean  Grave,  a  refusal  for  which  he  was 
most  bitterly  reproached  after  he  had  espoused  another 
cause  with  such  vigour. 

Zola's  early  sufferings  and  the  hard  struggles  of  his 
career  had  embittered  him  against  humanity.  He 
accorded  his  friendship,  his  confidence  even,  most  charily. 
I  should  even  now  hesitate  to  speak  of  myself  as 
having  been  his  friend.  I  do  not  think  that  any  one 
who  only  came  to  know  him  in  middle  life  can  claim  this 
title.  In  his  later  years  he  became  gracious  and  kindly, 
but  I  think  that  his  heart  never  opened  to  any  single  new 
acquaintance.  The  few  friends  whom  he  admitted  to 
that  title  were  men  who  had  been  young  with  him  in  the 
early  struggles.  If  warm  advances  were  made  towards 
him,  he  would  take,  on  his  side,  one  faltering  step  forward 
to  meet  them,  and  immediately  draw  two  steps  back.  I 
remember  that  when  I  sent  him  a  copy  of  the  book  I 
wrote  about  his  life  and  about  my  dealings  with  him, 
I  received  from  him,  some  days  later,  two  letters  of 
acknowledgment  and  thanks.  He  had  been  in  doubts 
about  my  address,  and,  having  written  one  letter  to  me 
to  one  address,  a  few  hours  later  wrote  a  second  letter 
to  another  place.  I  received  them  at  the  same  time. 
The  first  letter  which  I  opened  began,  "  Dear  Sir,"  and 
ended  with  the  French  equivalent  of  "  Yours  truly," 
It  contained  a  courteous  acknowledgment  of  my  book, 
and  informed  me  of  the  fact  that  it  had  been  written 
because  a  letter  posted  earlier  in  the  day  had  inadver- 
tently been  so  addressed  that  he  believed  that  it  would  not 
reach  me.  The  second  letter  began,  "  My  dear  Sherard,' 
spoke  of  my  book  as  "that  fine  monument  which  you 

30 


466  TWI-XTV    VI-ARS    IN    PARIS 

have  erected  for  the  edification  of  my  friends,  the 
EngHsh,"  and  concluded  with  expressions  of  warm  (grati- 
tude and  friendship.  This  was  the  one  which  he  had 
written  first.  It  was  the  step  forward  to  meet  my 
advances.     The  second  one  was  the  drawing  back. 

It  is  not  my  purpose  here  to  repeat  over  again  the 
story  of  my  long  acquaintance  with  Emile  Zola,  as  it  was 
told  in  my  book  about  him.  In  this  place  I  will  confine 
myself  to  certain  incidents  which  passed  between  us  after 
that  book  was  written.  But  before  doing  so  I  desire 
to  say  that  what  in  the  beginning  prompted  me  to  seek 
out  Zola's  acquaintance  and  constitute  myself  one  of  his 
first  apologists  in  England  was  the  indignation  which  I 
felt  at  the  judgment  which  at  that  time  had  been  passed 
by  certain  in  my  country  on  the  man,  for  whom  I  had  a 
profound  respect,  and  on  his  work,  which  had  won  imy 
deepest  admiration.  This  was  just  after  the  prosecution 
of  Vizetelly.  My  connection  with  the  London  press  was 
at  that  time  an  influential  one,  and  it  was,  thanks  to  this 
fact  alone,  that  I  was  enabled  to  make  his  cause  publicly 
my  own. 

In  those  days  it  was  as  difficult  to  mention  Zola's 
name  in  a  public  print  in  England  as  afterwards  it  became 
difficult  to  mention  Oscar  Wilde.  I  will  add  that  it  was 
fully  as  imprudent,  from  a  worldly  point  of  view,  which 
concerned  me  not  at  all.  This  campaign,  which  culmi- 
nated in  Zola's  first  visit  to  England,  was  initiated  under 
the  difficulties  described.  Many  editors  refused  to  allow 
me  to  speak  of  the  man  or  of  his  work  in  the  publications 
under  their  control.  I  remember  receiving  a  letter  from 
Sir  Walter  Besant,  in  which  he  said  that,  though  he 
sympathized  with  me  in  the  matter,  it  was  hopeless  to 
try  and  go  against  public  opinion  in  England,  "  where 
they  will  not  hear  of  Zola." 


WILLIAM    STEAD   AND   ZOLA  467 

In  a  recent  biography  of  Zola,  published  in  London, 
I  find  various  slighting  remarks  about  the  bearing  of 
William  Stead  towards  him  at  this  period.  Nothing  more 
unjust  has  ever  been  written.  It  was  mainly  thanks  to  the 
broad-mindedness  and  insight  of  that  most  able  of  editors, 
that,  in  the  Pall  Mall  Gazette,  I  was  able  gradually 
to  awaken  first  curiosity,  next  interest,  and  finally  sym- 
pathy in  a  subject  which  at  the  outset  was  under  social 
taboo.  In  those  days  my  signed  letters  from  Paris  in 
that  journal  were  very  widely  read.  I  had  a  lofty  tribune 
and  a  large  audience.  In  1890  the  Daily  Graphic  was 
founded,  and  here,  too,  thanks  to  the  sympathy  of  one 
of  the  best-read  journalists  in  London,  I  was  allowed  to 
write  on  Emile  Zola.  By  this  time  other  men  in  England 
were  taking  up  the  cause.  Mr.  Grein,  of  the  Independent 
Theatre,  had  the  courage  to  produce  Th^rese  Raquin  in 
1 89 1,  and  to  show  England  the  profound  morality  of 
Zola's  teachings.  Elsewhere  a  new  translation  of  his 
works  was  prepared  for  private  circulation,  so  that  those 
who  had  been  only  able  to  read  the  books  in  the  illiterate 
English  of  badly  paid  translators  might  be  induced  to  form 
another  opinion. 

But  even  in  the  following  year,  1892 — that  year 
memorable  in  the  history  of  literature,  when  La  Debacle 
was  published — Zola's  name  was  still  held  in  such  abhor- 
rence in  England  that,  as  Vizetelly  naively  confesses  in 
his  biography,  it  was  only  poverty  and  want  of  other 
employment  which  first  prompted  him  to  undertake  the 
translation  of  that  work.  He  relates  in  an  interesting 
passage  the  trouble  he  had  to  dispose  of  this  translation, 
and  the  rebuffs  he  received  until  he  found  in  Mr.  Kibble- 
white,  of  the  Weekly  Times  and  Echo,  an  editor  who  had 
the  good  sense  to  open  his  columns  to  the  English  version 
of  a  masterpiece  of  fiction,  and  gain  for  himself  the  high 


46S  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

distinction  oC  havinL;  I'lrst  m;ide  it  known  to  the  English 
peoples. 

I  have  no  feeling  of  pique  at  seeing  others  eating  the 
honey  of  my  own  mellification.  When  I  had  shaken 
hands  with  Zola  at  the  Metropole  Hotel  in  London, 
after  the  dinner  given  to  him  by  the  Authors'  Society, 
I  had  received  in  full  the  reward  of  what  I  had  done.  I 
must,  however,  refer  to  a  further  incident  in  connection 
with  the  publication  o^  La  Ddbdcle.  Vizetelly  relates  that 
he  deemed  it  prudent  not  to  attach  his  name  to  the  trans- 
lation which  was  published  in  the  Weekly  Times  and 
Echo.  I  had  no  such  hesitation,  although  in  my  case 
there  was  much  to  lose  and  nothing,  in  the  worldly  sense, 
to  gain.  I  felt  proud  to  associate  my  name  with  such  a 
work,  and  in  writing,  as  a  preface  to  the  publication  of 
the  story,  the  long  article  couched  in  the  form  of  an 
interview  with  Emile  Zola,  which  appeared  in  that  paper 
on  February  13,  1892,  I  not  only  signed  it  with  my 
name,  but  also  gave  my  full  address,  so  that  the  many 
correspondents  who  in  the  past  had  written  letters  of 
abuse  to  me  for  my  admiration  for  Zola  might  know  where 
to  send  me  their  further  insults. 

One  day  in  1893,  Zola  sent  round  to  my  house  to  ask 
me  if  I  would  come  and  see  him  that  evening,  saying  that 
he  wished  to  consult  me  on  an  important  matter.  At  the 
hour  appointed  I  went  to  his  house  accompanied  by 
another  Englishman.  Zola  then  told  me  that  he  had 
received  from  the  Institute  of  Journalists  in  London  an 
invitation  to  come  over,  together  with  other  prominent 
Frenchmen,  to  the  annual  gathering  of  that  society  which 
was  to  be  held  that  year  in  the  metropolis.  "  What  I 
want  you  to  tell  me,"  he  said,  "  is  first  what  is  this 
Institute  of  Journalists  ?  Has  it  any  influence  }  "  He 
then  said,  "  I  have  no  wish  to  see  London,  and  I   have 


ZOLA'S    FIRST   VISIT   TO    ENGLAND     469 

no  desire  to  be  feted.  If  I  consent  to  go,  it  will  be  with 
a  view  of  advancing  interest  in  my  books  in  England. 
I  shall  look  upon  it  as  ttne  affaire  de  rdclame  purely  and 
simply.  Do  you  think  that  with  this  object  in  view  it 
will  be  advisable  for  me  to  go  ?  My  own  inclination  at 
present  is  to  refuse."  I  said,  "You  certainly  ought  to 
go.  People  in  England  have  been  taught  to  consider 
you  an  obscene  monster.  You  figure  in  the  public  eye 
there  as  a  man  of  libidinous  habits,  with,  probably,  the 
reddest  of  noses.  You  must  go  and  show  them  that  you 
are  a  gentleman  of  respectable  appearance — respectable 
is  our  great  word  ;  that  your  manners  are  polished  ;  that 
you  do  not  get  habitually  or  even  occasionally  intoxicated  ; 
that  your  conversation  is  singularly  free  from  coarse 
allusions  and  reprehensible  expressions  ;  in  one  word, 
that  you  are  un  moiisietir  bien  propre  et  bien  convenable. 
You  will  be  seen  at  this  gathering  by  journalists  from  all 
parts  of  the  Three  Kingdoms.  These  will  be  proud  and 
delighted  to  have  met  you,  and  they  will  make  it  known, 
ckac7X7t  dans  son  pate  tin,  what  kind  of  man  you  really  are." 
He  said,  "  Thank  you  ;  that  is  exactly  what  I  wanted  to 
be  sure  about.      I  shall  accept  this  invitation." 

I  accompanied  him  to  London.  In  the  party  were 
Magnard  of  the  Figaro,  Fernand  Xau  of  the  Journal^ 
their  wives,  and  other  distinguished  ladies  and  gentlemen, 
besides  certain  of  my  English  colleagues  in  Paris,  who  in 
former  days  had  derided  my  enthusiasm  for  Emile  Zola, 
and  had  predicted  that  my  public  championship  of  his 
cause  would  lead  to  the  ruin  of  my  career.  Now  that  the 
star  was  a  rising  one,  they  were  glad  to  rush  in  in  its  wake. 
At  Dover  the  party  was  met  by  the  Continental  manager 
of  the  London,  Chatham,  and  Dover  line  and  others. 
The  public  rehabilitation  of  Emile  Zola  had  begun.  On 
the  way  up  to  London,  Zola  was  curious  to  know  what 


470  TWI-XTV    \i:.\RS    1\    PARIS 

kind  of  a  reception  awaited  him  at  V^ictoria  Station.  I 
said  th.it  it  would  no  doubt  be  a  cordial  one,  that  a 
delegation  from  the  Institute  of  Journalists  would  be 
there.  "  And,"  I  added,  "  no  doubt  also  the  fiuifare  de 
Lone/res^  '  He  said,  taking  me  quite  seriously  and 
looking  grave,   "Do  you  really  think  so.'*" 

I  did  not  accompany  him  to  any  of  the  festivities 
arranged  in  connection  with  the  gathering  of  the  Insti- 
tute, but  I  saw  him  constantly  in  the  evenings,  and  I 
naturally  attended  the  dinner  given  in  his  honour  by  the 
Society  of  Authors.  This  was  certainly  what  gave  him 
the  greatest  pleasure  of  any  of  the  honours  paid  him  in 
London.  I  was  sitting  at  one  of  the  lower  tables, 
exactly  at  right  angles  to  his  seat,  and  so  was  quite  close 
to  him.  More  than  once  during  that  dinner  he  raised 
his  glass  to  me  in  a  friendly  fashion,  and  afterwards 
when  I  met  him  in  the  vestibule  of  the  hotel,  outside  the 
dining-hall,  he  rushed  forward  and  shook  me  warmly  by 
the  hand.  Before  his  departure  he  wrote  to  me  that  as 
he  did  not  want  to  leave  London  without  once  more 
sitting  down  to  table  with  his  English  friends,  he  pro- 
posed to  give  a  dinner  at  the  Savoy  Hotel,  at  which  he 
prayed  my  attendance.  It  was  a  most  luxurious  repast, 
but  for  me  it  was  spoiled  by  the  fact  that  one  seat 
remained  vacant.  This  was  the  seat  of  George  Moore, 
who,  Zola  said,  had  not  answered  his  letter  of  invitation. 
I  knew  that  Moore  had  turned  his  back  upon  him,  and 
that  he  had  in  preparation  an  article  in  which  he  was  to 
explain  why  he  had  done  so.     This  was  the  article  which 

^  In  ever)'  small  French  town  and  village  even  there  is  a  "  fanfare," 
a  society  of  local  musicians,  whose  band  usually  assists  at  municipal 
ceremonies.  My  remark  was  intended  partly  as  a  joke  and  partly  to 
impress  upon  him,  by  contrast,  the  immensity  of  the  metropolis  which 
he  was  visiting  for  the  first  time. 


GEORGE    MOORE    AND    EMILE    ZOLA     471 

afterwards  appeared  in  the  English  Illustrated  Magazine. 
I  felt  that,  secure  as  Zola's  position  now  seemed  to  be  in 
England,  the  defection  of  Moore,  whom  I  had  always 
considered  and  still  do  consider  one  of  the  first,  if  not  the 
very  first,  of  our  English  novelists,  might  endanger  that 
position,  and  at  any  rate  give  a  great  encouragement 
to  his  irreconcilable  enemies.  It  quite  spoiled  the 
evening  for  me. 

Very  shortly  after  his  return  to  France  my  book  was 
published  in  London.  It  achieved  nothing  more  than  a 
succes  d'estime.  But  being  widely  and  most  eulogistically 
reviewed,  it  sounded  the  final  blast  of  trumpets  of  Zola's 
triumph  over  British  prejudice.  An  English  colleague 
of  mine  in  Paris  warned  me  that  I  should  live  to  regret 
the  day  on  which  I  had  given  it  forth.  There  are  few 
things  in  my  literary  career  on  which  I  look  back 
with  greater  satisfaction.  The  other  day,  after  reading 
the  biography  of  Zola  which  Vizetelly  published  last 
year,  without  finding  in  it  a  single  line  to  record  the 
constant  and  unceasing  struggle — carried  on  at  every 
risk  to  myself — of  which  that  book  was  the  crowning 
stroke  and  final  expression,  I  took  down  my  volume 
from  the  shelves  of  my  library  and  on  the  title-page 
wrote  in  fair  writing  a  pentameter  attributed  to  Virgil  by 
Donatus. 

I  will  pass  over  the  next  few  years  and  come  to 
November,  1897,  when  I  had  returned  to  Paris  from 
London  at  the  request  of  the  editor  of  a  great  American 
magazine  to  write  an  account  of  the  Dreyfus  affair,  as  it 
stood  up  to  that  time.  My  account  was  a  purely  historic 
one.  I  recorded  the  facts  of  the  case  as  they  were  then 
to  be  ascertained,  and  gave  what  had  been  my  impres- 
sions at  the  terrible  scene  of  the  degradation.  I  have 
before  me  a  copy  of  the  manuscript,  which  covers  forty- 


4/2  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

tour  pages  of  typewritten  paper,  and  which  was  published 
ift  cxUnso  in  a  syndicate  of  all  the  leading  newspapers  in 
the  United  States.  I  find  the  following  passage  at  the 
conclusion  of  the  part  dealing  with  the  degradation, 
which,  as  ever  since  1897  I  have  been  branded  by  the 
Jewish  papers  as  a  Jew-baiter  and  "  anti-Drey fusite," 
I   beg  leave  to  reproduce  here  : 

"  Yet  during  the  terrible  penance  of  this  march  of 
infamy,  despite  the  insults  levelled  at  him  like  so  many 
expectorations  by  many  of  those  before  whom  he  passed, 
in  spite  of  the  frantic  menaces  of  the  exasperated 
mob  without,  Dreyfus  never  once  departs  from  his 
calm.  With  a  courage  that  bordered  on  heroism,  he 
marched  firm  and  erect,  with  his  head  high  up,  and 
more  than  once  he  is  heard  to  cry  in  a  loud  and  steady 
voice,  '  Vive  la  France  !  I  swear  that  I  am  innocent.' 
As  he  passes  before  the  assembled  pressmen  he  cries, 
'  In  the  face  of  all  France,  I  swear  that  I  am  innocent ! ' 
A  reserve  officer  who  is  standing  by  answers  with  a 
'Judas!  Traitor!  Jew!'  Now  he  reaches  the  prison 
van.  Here  the  gendarmes  gather  roughly  round  him. 
The  click  of  handcuffs  is  heard,  and  it  is  seen  that  a 
human  form  is  bundled  with  every  gesture  of  disgust  and 
loathing  into  the  cart  of  infamy.  The  escort  forms  round 
it  and  the  prison-van  drives  off  The  drums  roll,  the 
band  strikes  up  a  merry,  soul-inspiriting  march.  Sadly 
is  such  music  needed,  for  every  heart  here  is  very  heavy — 
every  heart  is  low.  One  by  one  the  companies  file  off^ 
and  soon  the  large  square  is  left  empty.  Only  in  the 
centre  of  the  muddy  waste  is  a  little  heap  of  refuse  that 
glitters  in  the  sun.  It  was  all  that  remained  of  a  soldier's 
glory,  of  the  honour  of  a  man." 

My  history  of  the  case  up  to  that  day  concluded  with 
the  following  sentences  :  "  At  the  same  time  it  must  be 


L'AFFAIRE    DREYFUS  473 

said,  that  all  those  who  have  espoused  the  cause  of 
Alfred  Dreyfus  are  to-day  more  assured  than  ever  that 
his  innocence  will  be  established.  Bernard  Lazare,  only 
two  days  ago,  declared  to  me  that  Dreyfus  will  be 
a  free  man  within  two  or  three  months  at  the  latest. 
The  same  opinion  has  been  expressed  to  me  in  most 
emphatic  terms  by  Monsieur  Emile  Zola,  who  has 
staked  his  popularity — indeed,  his  literary  reputation 
also — on  proving  the  innocence  of  Alfred  Dreyfus." 

At  that  time  Zola  had  only  published  his  first  writings 
in  the  Figaro  on  behalf  of  Captain  Dreyfus.  I  saw  him 
often  during  November,  when  he  seemed  calm.  It  was 
towards  the  beginning  of  December  that  he  began  to 
show  signs  of  great  exasperation.  On  December  9,  I 
was  at  Daudet's  house,  and  I  asked  Daudet,  who  was 
one  of  Zola's  oldest  friends  in  Paris,  what,  in  his  view, 
was  Zola's  prompting  in  setting  himself  thus  against 
public  opinion  in  France,  when  we  knew  that  it  was  a 
rule  of  his  life  not  to  concern  himself  in  the  affairs  of 
others.     Daudet  said  : 

"  II  est  furieux  contre  tout  le  monde.  He  was 
dining  here  last  night,  and  seemed  in  a  state  of  the 
greatest  irritation.  The  fact  is  that  he  has  been  greatly 
exasperated  at  the  public  reception  given  to  his  articles 
in  the  Figaro,  and  especially  by  the  ridicule  that  his 
description  of  Scheurer-Kestner  as  un  dme  de  cristal 
has  brought  upon  him.  He  seems  to  have  fancied  that 
it  would  be  sufficient  for  him  to  say,  '  Dreyfus  is  inno- 
cent! '  for  everybody  to  accept  the  fact.  He  has  in  the 
last  year  or  two  acquired  a  greatly  exaggerated  view  of 
his  own  importance.  He  feels  that  nothing  must  go  on 
in  public  in  France  in  which  he  does  not  play  a  part.  I 
believe  that  if  they  cut  a  woman's  throat  in  Montmartre 
il  voudrait  en  itre. 


474  TWF.XTV    VICARS    IN    PARIS 

"And  then  there  is  another  cause.  In  Paris  to-day 
no  interest  whatever  is  taken  in  anything  but  this  affaire 
Dreyfus,  Nobody  reads  anything-  else  in  the  papers  ; 
nobody  talks  about  anything  else.  Zola's  feuillcton 
('Paris')  which  is  appearing  in  the  Journal,  might 
just  as  well  not  be  printed  at  all.  Nobody  is  reading 
it ;  nobody  speaks  about  it.  That  is  what  Zola  cannot 
stand.  I  am  suffering  myself  in  exactly  the  same  way. 
My  '  Soutien  de  Famille,'  which  is  coming  out  in  the 
Illustration,  is  not  being  read  by  anybody  ;  but  I  am 
not  anxious  on  that  account,  for  I  know  that  after  this 
excitement  has  cooled  down  my  readers  will  all  come 
back  to  me." 

He  then  went  on  to  speak  about  the  braves  gens  of 
the  various  court-martials  whose  good  faith  seemed  to 
be  impugned  by  the  agitation.  It  was  the  last  time  I 
saw  him.  He  died  a  week  later.  His  words  to  me 
assumed  by  the  circumstance  the  nature  of  a  testament. 

That  he  misread  the  character  and  motives  of  his 
old  friend  cannot  now  be  doubted,  but  it  was  certainly 
not  from  any  injustice  or  unkindness.  I  have  noticed 
in  life  that  the  men  who  have  the  least  comprehension 
of  the  true  characters  of  the  people  about  them  are 
the  very  men  whose  art  it  is  to  depict  character — great 
novelists  whose  very  skill  in  the  painting  of  imaginary 
men  and  women  has  secured  their  wide  popularity.  But 
the  novelist  knows  what  stuff  his  puppets  are  made  of 
The  living  man  and  all  the  mysterious  inner  workings 
which  guide  his  actions  are  to  him  as  closed  as  they 
are  to  all  those  to  whom  supernatural  insight  has  not 
been  given. 

On  that  same  occasion  Daudet  spoke  to  me  in 
high  praise  of  another  man,  a  mutual  acquaintance.  He 
praised  his  entire  loyalty,  his  singleness  of  purpose,  and 


I 


DAUDET'S    READING    OF   CHARACTER     475 

he  told  me  that  I  was  fortunate  to  possess  so  true  a 
friend.  Already  then  the  mask  was  peeling  off  this 
man's  face.  In  the  event  he  showed  himself  to  have 
been  all  along  a  most  unworthy  person.  In  both  cases 
Daudet's  reading  had  been  quite  wrong. 

On  my  return  to  England  I  was  invited  to  contribute 
an  article  on  the  Dreyfus  affair  to  the  Saturday  Review ; 
and  giving  the  facts  as  they  then  stood,  I  deplored 
Zola's  action  in  the  matter,  because  I  knew  what  the 
result  would  be  upon  his  life  and  career.  I  was  walking 
just  behind  him  at  Daudet's  funeral.  He  paced  along, 
holding  one  of  the  strings  of  Daudet's  pall,  amidst  the 
jeers  of  the  populace.  He  looked  crushed,  utterly 
dejected.  I  felt  that  he  was  risking  his  health,  his 
reason,  his  very  life  in  a  matter  where  his  intervention 
was  useless.  Indeed,  Zola's  sacrifice  was,  if  glorious  to 
his  name,  entirely  superfluous.  It  was  at  a  far  mightier 
dictate  that  the  powers  moved  at  a  time  when  the 
Dreyfus  incident  could  be  used  as  the  primary  pretext 
for  that  action  which  during  the  last  three  or  four  years  has 
entirely  revolutionized  the  social  order  of  things  in  France, 
dominated  the  army,  cast  the  clergy  adrift.  My  article  was 
a  true  expression  of  occurrences  and  opinions  in  France. 

During  the  whole  of  my  career  as  a  Paris  corre- 
spondent I  have  always  limited  myself  to  giving,  with 
all  the  scrupulous  exactness  and  fidelity  which  I  could 
compass,  the  true  facts,  the  preponderating  weight  of 
public  opinion.  In  this  particular  case  the  interests  not 
only  of  justice  were  best  served  by  such  a  line  of  conduct, 
but  the  cause  also  of  the  very  man  who  was  considered 
abroad  the  victim  of  injustice.  The  calumnies  and  lies 
which  were  spread  broadcast  over  the  world  at  this  time 
served  only  to  exasperate  public  opinion  in  France  and 
to  retard  the  day  of  justice. 


476  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

Before  leaving  Paris  I  sj)ent  one  afternoon  in  Zola's 
company  at  his  house,  listening  to  his  views  on  anti- 
Semitism  in  general  and  in  Erance  in  particular.  He 
spoke  with  much  fervour ;  but  his  views,  broad  and 
humanitarian  as  they  were,  were  not  such  as  to  please 
the  orthodox  Jews.  He  proposed  as  a  remedy  for  the 
antagonism  of  the  two  races  that  intermarriage  which 
in  the  orthodox  Jewish  press  is  so  constantly  denounced. 
His  fine  pronouncements  on  that  occasion  I  afterwards 
reprinted  in  full. 

On  January  24  of  the  following  year,  Mr.  W.  T. 
Stead  received  from  Mr.  \V.  R.  Hearst,  proprietor  of 
the  New  York  Journal  (now  the  New  York  American 
afid  JoJirnal)  and  San  Francisco  Examiner,  a  cablegram 
asking  him  to  go  to  Paris  and  interview  Zola  for  these 
journals.  All  attempts  to  induce  Zola  to  open  his  lips 
on  the  case  made  by  correspondents  in  Paris  had  failed. 
Mr.  Hearst  offered  any  fee  that  Mr.  Stead  cared  to  name 
by  reply  cable  for  the  service.  Mr.  Stead  cabled  back 
to  Mr.  Hearst  that  the  only  man  in  Europe  to  whom 
Zola  might  be  willing  to  talk  was  myself.  Mr.  Hearst 
then  cabled  to  Mr.  White,  his  correspondent  in  London, 
to  find  me  and  ask  me  if  I  would  undertake  the  attempt. 
Mr.  White  telegraphed  in  various  directions  and  to 
different  parts  of  the  world.  At  that  time  I  was  quietly 
reclining  on  a  couch,  smoking  cigarettes  and  congratulat- 
ing myself  on  being  away  from  the  frenzied  turmoil  of 
Paris  in  a  club  not  more  than  a  mile  distant  from  Mr. 
Hearst's  London  office.  Here  the  telegrams  eventually 
"touched"  me.  I  communicated  with  Mr.  White,  and 
went  over  to  Paris  the  same  evening. 

On  arriving  there,  after  I  had  waited  until  a  reason- 
able hour  for  calling  upon  Zola,  I  went  to  his  house. 
He  received  me  with  his  usual  kindness,  and  declined 


MY   INTERVIEW  WITH    ZOLA  477 

menie  pour  votis  to  say  a  single  word.  However,  one 
had  faced  greater  difficulties  in  the  quest  of  news  than 
this.  I  sat  down  by  his  side  on  the  divan  in  his  dining- 
room  and  talked  at  him  for  nearly  half  an  hour.  I 
pointed  out  to  him  that  some  sort  of  statement  was 
expected  of  him,  and  that  by  making  me  the  agency 
through  which  it  was  given  to  the  world  he  would  put 
a  stop  to  all  the  inventions  which  were  being  published 
in  connection  with  his  name.  I  laid  before  him  several 
"fake"  interviews  with  him  which  had  appeared  in 
various  papers  both  in  London  and  the  States,  and 
notably  one  from  a  big  New  York  paper,  which  was 
headed  in  startling  capitals  running  across  three  columns' 
width  : 

FRANCE  REFUSES  TO  ALLOW  ZOLA 
TO  SEE  DREYFUS  FOR  THE  

In  this  particular  invention  it  was  stated  that  Zola  had 
been  considering  an  offer  from  the  proprietors  of  that 
journal  to  go  out  to  the  Devil's  Island  and  interview 
Captain  Dreyfus. 

This  impressed  him  a  good  deal,  and  in  the  end  he 
consented  to  make  a  short  statement  through  me.  But 
he  requested  me  to  call  again  at  nine  in  the  evening,  as 
he  wished  to  have  full  time  to  consider  what  he  might 
and  what  he  might  not  say.  I  demurred  at  the  postpone- 
ment, for  reflection  might  lead  him  to  such  prudence — 
I  am  here  speaking  purely  in  the  character  of  a  news- 
paper reporter — as  would  render  his  statement  valueless. 
However,  he  insisted  upon  this  condition.  At  nine 
o'clock  that  same  evening  I  saw  him  again.  He  asked 
me  to  begin  by  denying  in  his  name  the  authenticity 
of  any  of  the  "  interviews "  with  him  which  had  been 
published  in  any  paper  during  the  previous  month.     As 


4;S  TWI'NTY   YRARS    IN    PARIS 

to  tlic  details  of  his  trial,  he  said  that  he  was  bound 
by  an  oath  to  Labori  not  to  divulge  by  a  single  word 
the  plan  of  his  defence.  He  then  made  the  following 
statement,  which  I  took  down  in  his  presence  : 

"  I  deny  with  all  the  emphasis  of  which  I  am  capable 
that  I  ever  wished  to  insult  the  French  army.  It  is 
a  monstrous  accusation.  My  books  betray  my  deep 
affection  for  the  French  nation  ;  and  what  is  the  army, 
since  the  advent  of  universal  conscription,  but  the  nation 
in  arms  ?  I  have  acknowledo^ed  over  and  over  ao^ain 
the  splendid  heroism  of  the  French  army,  and  the 
readiness  of  each  individual  soldier  to  spring  to  arms 
at  the  first  call  by  France." 

Zola  spoke  with  deep  emotion.  He  continued  by 
saying  : 

"  I  am  not  fearful  of  the  consequences.  In  this 
trial  the  authorities  dare  not  drive  me  to  extremities. 
I  am  known  as  a  man  who  cannot  be  too  far  trifled 
with. 

"  I  believe  that  in  heart  the  Government  is  very 
sorry  to  have  to  prosecute  me.  I  rejoice,  however,  in 
this  prosecution,  because  whatever  its  issue  may  be  to 
me,  it  must  bring  on  a  revision  of  the  Dreyfus  trial. 
After  the  Esterhazy  trial  people  were  saying  the  affair 
was  now  settled,  and  but  for  my  action  no  doubt  the 
revision  would  have  been  shelved.      Now  it  must  come. 

"  The  detention  of  Dreyfus  in  prison  is  a  monstrous 
iniquity,  and  everybody  behind  the  scenes  knows  it  ; 
but  delay  is  what  they  want,  for  numerous  reasons. 
There  are  elections  pending  ;  bargains  have  been  made 
and  must  be  kept  by  deputies  who,  by  their  vote  yester- 
day, seemed  to  condemn  my  attitude.  The  election 
past,  the  revision,  if  applied  for  in  due  form,  will  be 
granted  quite  as  a  matter  of  course.     Dreyfus'  innocence 


I 


ZOLA'S    PROPHETIC    UTTERANCES     479 

will  yet  be  recognised  and  he  will  be  a  free  man.  It 
will  be  some  time  in   coming,  but  it  will  come. 

"  The  consequences  of  the  trial  cannot  be  very  serious. 
To  me  a  fine  is  trifling,  and  my  imprisonment  cannot 
be  a  long  one.  My  books  may  suffer,  but  I  have  had 
no  confirmation  from  my  publisher  of  the  report  which 
appeared  in  the  papers  yesterday  that  my  new  book  is 
being  countermanded  in  large  quantities  by  booksellers 
who  had  ordered  stocks. 

"  I  stand  with  Dreyfus'  friends,  entirely  alone  and 
unsupported.  Everybody  and  everything  are  against  us  ; 
the  Government  because  of  a  blunder  committed  by 
the  unthinking  and  illiterate  middle  classes,  who  cannot 
reason  ;  the  people  because  they  are  infected  with  this 
pestilent  anti-Semitism. 

"  We  have  no  papers  but  those  of  the  smallest 
circulation.  On  the  other  side,  in  all  the  press  of 
France,  I  am  held  up  as  the  enemy  of  France,  because 
foreigners  approve  of  my  attitude.  Yet  I  receive  many 
warm  letters  of  encouragement  from  Frenchmen.  It 
would  break  my  heart  were  I  not  certain,  as  I  again 
repeat,  that  truth  will  prevail.  A  great  nation,  thirsting 
for  justice,  will  come  to  acknowledge  the  truth  in  the 
end — tardily,  perhaps,  but  surely — as  surely  as  the  wave 
breaks  on  the  rocks." 

I  at  once  telegraphed  this  statement  to  London  to 
be  forwarded  thence  to  New  York.  It  is  a  significant 
fact  that  although  this  dispatch  was  "  filed  "  at  my  end 
at  the  telegraph  office  at  the  Gare  du  Nord  at  9.30  p.m., 
and  ought  in  consequence  to  have  been  delivered  in  Fleet 
Street  at  the  latest  one  hour  afterwards,  it  did  not  reach 
Mr.  White  until  three  o'clock  on  the  following  morning. 
It  had,  of  course,  been  sent  down  to  the  Ministry  of  the 
Interior  for  perusal  before  being  forwarded  on  the  wires. 


48o  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

On  the  26th,  Mr.  Hearst  cabled  to  me  the  whole 
text  of  a  leading  article  which  had  appeared  in  the 
Journal  and  in  the  Exaviiner  based  on  my  despatch, 
requesting  me  to  go  and  read  it  to  Monsieur  Zola. 
It  was  a  stirring  tribute  to  his  courage  and  the  justice 
of  his  cause.  I  went  to  Zola's  house.  I  was  received  at 
once,  and  I  showed  him  the  numerous  sheets  on  which 
this  long  cable  was  printed.  I  then  began  to  translate 
the  article  to  him.  It  throws  some  light  on  one  side 
of  his  character  that  before  I  had  read  more  than  a 
hundred  words  of  it,  he  put  his  hand  on  my  arm,  and 
said,  "  Voyons,  mon  ami,  comment  voulez-vous  que 
cela  m'interesse  ?  "  ("  Come,  my  friend,  how  do  you  expect 
that  to  interest  me  ?  "). 

At  the  further  request  of  Mr.  Hearst,  I  remained 
in  Paris  and  attended  Zola's  trial.  On  the  first  day 
I  came  out  of  court  with  him  during  an  adjournment, 
with  a  number  of  his  other  friends.  As  we  were  turninof 
down  the  passage  to  the  right  from  the  Salle  des  Pas 
Perdus  of  the  Criminal  Court,  a  rush  of  yelling  fanatics 
was  made.  The  very  evident  purpose  of  these  people 
was  to  assault  Zola,  perhaps  to  murder  him.  We 
closed  round  our  friend  and  managed  to  hustle  him  into 
the  cloak-room  on  the  right  of  that  passage  before  any 
injury  had  befallen  him.  For  my  part  I  received  a 
blow  intended  for  him   which  nearly  broke  my  back. 

At  that  time  there  were  appearing  in  a  London 
evening  paper,  with  which  I  had  formerly  been  con- 
nected, some  unsigned  articles  in  which  Zola  was  vio- 
lently attacked  as  a  writer  and  as  a  man,  in  his  person, 
his  principles,  and  his  very  family.  It  was  here  first 
alleged  that  Zola  descended  from  una  farniglia  di 
Ghetto.  I  presumed  that  Zola  attributed  the  author- 
ship   of   these    articles    to  me,   for    one    day  as    I   was 


THE    ZOLA   TRIAL  481 

passing  in  front  of  Madame  Zola  to  gain  my  seat 
amongst  the  correspondents  who  were  reporting  the 
trial,  she  said,  "  Quel  mauvais  article  vous  avez  fait 
centre  mon  mari !  "  ("  What  a  nasty  article  you  have 
written  against  my  husband  !  "). 

The  long  trial  involved  a  terrible  strain,  though 
when  the  graphologists  were  discoursing  on  the  bor- 
dereau, one  had  the  opportunity  of  enjoying  a  grateful 
repose.  I  was  very  uncomfortably  placed — for  on  the 
afternoon  of  the  second  day  of  the  trial  a  gentle- 
man, the  correspondent  of  a  Viennese  paper,  had 
installed  himself  in  my  place,  deleting  the  name  of 
my  paper  upon  the  label,  which  was  pasted  in  front  of 
my  seat,  and  inscribing  that  of  his  own  journal. 
My  good  nature  prevented  me  from  causing  him  to  be 
ejected.  He  was  a  bulky  man,  yet  there  was  room 
for  both  of  us  if  I  contented  myself  with  a  cramped 
position.  On  the  following  morning,  however,  on 
reaching  the  court,  I  found  that  he  had  invited,  to 
occupy  the  little  place  which  had  been  left  to  me 
by  his  encroachment,  another  reporter,  a  Berlin  co- 
religionary.  This  time  I  insisted  on  my  vested  rights, 
and  the  second  intruder  went  away  saying  that  he  was 
going  to  get  satisfaction.  There  was  an  advantage, 
however,  to  me  in  my  position,  because,  as  we  were  so 
crowded,  I  could  not  help  but  see  the  report  which 
the  Viennese  correspondent  was  writing  under  my  eyes. 
It  was  very  typical  of  the  way  in  which  the  outside 
public  was  being  informed  of  the  tendence  and  "  atmo- 
sphere "  of  the  trial.  One  morning  I  saw  him  write 
that  Esterhazy  was  standing  in  the  middle  of  the  court, 
that  everybody  had  turned  his  back  upon  him,  that  he 
stood  there  cowed  with  the  consciousness  of  his  infamy. 
I  asked  my  neighbour  if  he  would  point  out  the  Major 

31 


482  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

to  me,  (ov  1  knew  that  Ksterhazy  had  not  yet  reached 
the  Palais  de  justice,  and  he  laughed  and  said,  "  Das 
ist  ja  nur  Alios  malcrischcs."  '  Some  time  later  that  lie, 
with  others,  went  off  by  the  porter  to  be  telegraphed 
to  Vienna. 

The  trial  interested  me  particularly  from  the  vehe- 
mence of  the  passions  displayed.  I  was  at  last  able 
to  realize  the  sittings  of  the  Revolutionary  Tribunal. 
I  had  told  my  editor  from  the  first  how  the  day  would 
go  ;  I  had  even  given  him  in  advance  the  sentences  which 
would  be  passed.  But  none  the  less  after  the  sentence 
had  been  read  out,  and  I  had  escaped  into  the  passage 
of  the  court  to  hurry  home  to  see  if  my  arrangements 
for  the  prompt  transmission  of  the  news  to  New  York 
had  been  successfully  carried  out,  I  felt  much  moved, 
and  indeed  committed  the  imprudence  of  saying  aloud, 
"  C'est  epouvantable ! "  ("It  is  dreadful!")  This 
exclamation,  which  had  been  wrung  from  me  by  the  sight 
of  Zola  facing  the  howling  mob,  might  have  cost  me 
some  serious  injury.  It  was  overheard  by  some  men 
who  were  passing  me  at  the  time.  They  turned  round 
menacingly,  and  but  for  the  intervention  of  the  two 
gardes  de  Paris  who  were  on  duty  at  the  door  of  that 
passage,  I  should  have  been  attacked  by  men  who  were 
in  a  state  of  excitement  bordering  on  insanity.  The 
next  night  I  went  to  see  Zola.  His  valet,  who  opened 
the  hall-door  in  the  house  in  the  Rue  de  Bruxelles,  said, 
on  recognizing  me,  "  I  don't  think  that  Monsieur  Zola 
will  see  you.  He  is  tres  niont^  contre  vous."  I  sent 
him  up  to  inquire,  and  he  returned  to  say  that  the 
"  patron "   refused   to  see   me. 

I  went  out  into  the  street  and  entered  a  small  cafS 
round  the  corner,  in  the  Rue  de  Clichy,  where  I  sat 
^  "  That  is  all  merely  for  the  sake  of  picturesqueness." 


MY   LEAVE-TAKING   OF    ZOLA         483 

down  and  wrote  a  letter  to  Zola.  It  was  written  under 
great  stress  of  emotion.  I  reminded  him  of  our  past 
friendship;  I  reminded  him  that  during  the  very  trial  I  had 
exposed  myself  in  his  defence  ;  I  added  that  it  was  in  the 
order  of  human  things  that  while  he  refused  me  his  door, 
he  accorded  a  des  cyniques  bonsJiommes  leurs  grandes 
entrdes.  I  concluded  by  praying  God  to  have  him  in 
His  holy  keeping.  This  letter  I  despatched  to  his 
house  by  a  messenger,  who  presently  returned  with  a 
note  for  me.  The  envelope  contained  Zola's  card,  and 
on  it  was  written,  "  Come  at  nine."  My  eyes  filled. 
An  English  journalist  who  had  accompanied  me  and 
was  sitting  with  me  in  the  cafd  burst  out  into  mocking 
laughter  at  the  sight  of  my  emotion. 

I  returned  at  nine  o'clock  to  Zola's  house.  It  was 
the  last  time  that  I  saw  him  on  earth.  He  received 
me  kindly,  and  asked  me  if  my  conscience  did  not 
accuse  me  of  disloyalty  towards  him.  I  then  learned 
that  it  was  the  articles  in  the  evening  paper  attributed 
to  me  which  had  aroused  his  indignation.  I  assured 
him  of  my  innocence  in  this  matter.  I  told  him  that 
I  had  written  nothing  about  him  beyond  the  few  lines 
in  the  Saturday  Review,  which  I  had  sent  him  on  the 
day  of  its  appearance.  I  added  that  my  reports  day 
by  day  to  America  had  invariably  been  couched  in 
terms  of  sympathy  with  him,  and  I  added,  "  You  may 
say  that  there  was  no  merit  in  that ;  that  Hearst  would 
not  have  printed  anything  derogatory  to  you.  I  assure 
you,  however,  ^naitre.,  that  I  have  never  felt  anything 
for  you  but  the  deepest  loyalty  and  regret." 

"  Regret! "  he  cried, 

"Yes,"  I  said,  "because  you  have  no  business  in 
this  affair.     We  cannot  spare  you  for  it." 

He  then  repeated,  "  If  your  conscience  absolves  you." 


484  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

We  went  on  to  talk  of  other  things.  It  was  obvious 
to  me  that  he  felt  deeply  the  insult  of  being  sentenced 
to  imprisonment.  I  said  to  him  at  one  time,  "If  you 
go  to  prison,  shall  you  write  while  there  ?"  He  answered 
quite  crossly,  "  You  don't  suppose  that  they  will  put 
me  to  making  selvage  slippers  ("qu'ils  vont  me  mettre 
a   tresser  des   chaussons  de  lisiere  "). 

His  little  dog,  which  was  none  too  friendly  to  people 
not  of  the  house,  had  climbed  up  upon  the  divan  between 
us  and  thence  on  to  my  knees.  I  said,  "  Your  dog  at 
least  does  not  take  me  for  a  traitor."  He  smiled  at  that, 
and  was,  I  think,  about  to  say  something  kind,  when 
the  servant  announced  the  visit  of  the  Socialist  deputy, 
Gerault-Richard,  a  member  of  the  very  party  which 
was  to  reap  all  the  benefit  of  Zola's  struggle,  his 
sufferings,  and  the  shipwreck  of  his  career.  I  took 
leave  of  him  then.  He  walked  with  me  to  the  head 
of  the  stairs.     We  shook  hands,  and  so  we  parted. 

In  writing  about  Alphonse  Daudet  I  have  no  hesita- 
tion in  calling  him  my  friend.  He  was  the  first  to  give 
me  that  right.  In  ending  the  letter  which  he  wrote 
me  after  my  book  on  his  life  and  work  had  been  read 
to  him,  he  said,  "  It  is  with  good  and  solid  friendship 
that  one  repays  such  things  as  these."  ("  Ces  choses 
la  se  paient  avec  de  la  bonne  et  solide  amitie,")  It 
was  in  order  to  divert  my  mind  from  the  terrible  grief 
which  had  come  upon  me  in  1895  that  during  his 
visit  to  London  he  proposed  to  me  to  write  a  book 
with  him. 

Once  before  his  kindness  had  led  him  thus  to  assist 
another  writer,  Hugues  Leroux,  who  has  since  come 
to  high  honours.  But  in  that  case  I  believe  the 
younger  man  merely  transcribed  the  master's  words. 
In   the  writing  of  My  First    Voyage,   My  First  Lie,   a 


"MY   FIRST   VOYAGE"  485 

considerable  part  of  the  work  fell  to  my  share.  Certainly 
a  large  portion  of  the  book  was  the  story  retold  as 
Daudet  had  told  it  to  me,  written  from  hasty  notes 
after  an  interval  of  two  years,  but  there  were  other 
parts  which  were  entirely  my  own.^ 

After  his  death.  Monsieur  Ebner,  Daudet's  secretary, 
asked  me  for  my  manuscript  for  translation  into  French. 
I  gave  it  to  him,  and  amongst  Daudet's  works  now 
figures  the  story  Premier  Mensonge,  which  is  a  transla- 
tion from  my  English.  In  England  some  anxiety  was 
shown  by  certain  critics,  while  unanimous  in  praising 
the  delicate  charm  of  the  book  (all  Daudet's  own)  to 
minimize,  as  far  as  possible,  my  share  in  the  work. 
Indeed,  that  to  some  reviewers  seemed  the  main  purpose 
of  their  reviews  of  the  book.  Daudet  himself  held 
his  collaborator  in  no  such  contempt. 

While  we  were  working  at  this  book  in  the  Rue  de 
Bellechasse  two  incidents  occurred  of  a  dramatic  nature. 
One  day,  just  as  I  reached  the  top  of  the  staircase 
leading  to  Daudet's  apartment,  a  well-dressed  young 
man  who  had  followed  me  up  rushed  past  me  and 
reached  the  door  first.  I  thought  that  he  was  some 
friend  of  the  family  whom  I  did  not  know,  and  I  readily 

^  By  the  alteration  of  one  word  in  my  preface  to  that  book  I  have 
been  represented  as  stating  that  I  hmited  myself  to  the  part  of 
transcriber  only.  Some  time  before  the  book  was  written  I  published 
in  the  Daily  Chronicle,  after  submitting  the  manuscript  of  my  letter  to 
Alphonse  Daudet,  the  exact  account  of  our  several  parts  in  the  work. 
I  said,  "  The  first  three  chapters  and  the  last  three  chapters  are  in 
notes  only,  for  my  exclusive  elaboration.  The  arrangement  of  the 
incidents  and  the  development  of  the  characters  were  discussed  at 
length  between  us,  and,  further,  there  falls  to  my  share  to  put  into  a 
form  acceptable  to  English  readers  a  purely  French  tale.  On  the 
other  hand,  long  passages  were  entirely  taken  down  from  Mr.  Daudet's 
lips." 


4S6  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

yielded  precedence  to  him.  While  he  was  in  Daudet's 
study  I  sat  down  in  the  antechamber  on  which  the 
doors  ot  that  workroom  opened.  The  visit  was  a  lonof 
one.  Suddenly  I  heard  angry  voices,  and  as  though 
Daudet  and  the  stranger  were  quarrelling,  I  was 
afraid  that  it  might  be  indiscreet  for  me  to  remain 
where  I  was,  and  I  was  about  to  leave  the  apartment, 
intending  to  return  later,  when  I  heard  the  word 
"  revolver  "  used.  I  then  hesitated  no  longer,  but  flung 
open  the  study  door  and  walked  in.  "  What  is  this 
about  a  revolver  ? "  I  cried.  I  found  Daudet  sitting 
behind  his  desk,  greatly  agitated.  He  was  holding  a 
revolver,  which  shook  in  his  hand.  The  stranger  was 
bending  over  the  writing-table  in  a  menacing  attitude. 
"  What's  this  about  revolvers?"  I  cried  again.  The 
stranger  turned,  snatched  up  his  hat,  and  bolted  from 
the  room.  I  cried  out,  "Shall  I  stop  him,  master?" 
Daudet   shook  his  head. 

it  was  some  minutes  before  he  recovered  sufficiently 
to  give  me  an  account  of  what  had  happened.  The 
stranger  was  a  mere  beggar,  one  of  those  types  whom 
I  have  described  in  a  former  chapter  when  writing 
about  the  modern  Cour  des  Miracles  of  Paris.  He  had 
introduced  himself  to  Daudet  as  a  man  of  letters  who 
had  fallen  into  utter  destitution.  "  He  spoke  of  his 
starving  family,  his  poor  children,  toute  la  lyre.  I  did 
not  like  his  looks.  Starving:  ireniuses  are  not  dressed 
in  the  height  of  fashion.  But  there  was  the  chance 
that  his  story  might  be  true,  and  you  know  how  I 
compassionate  the  poor.  So  I  gave  him  a  louis  and 
told  him  that  if  he  was  an  honest  man  he  would  keep 
his  word  and  pay  it  back.  He  then  said  that  a  louis 
was  of  no  use  to  him  and  he  clenched  his  fist  and  bent 
over  me  threateningly.     Ah  !    mais  I    that   changed   the 


DAUDET   AND   HIS   TWO   VISITORS    487 

question,  I  always  have  a  loaded  revolver  in  this 
drawer,  for  I  receive  strange  visitors  sometimes — 
thanks  to  my  mania  for  not  refusing  my  door  to  any- 
body ;  I  pulled  it  out,  and  then  you  came  in.  To  think, 
mon  pauvre  Sherard,  that  you  have  been  sitting  in  that 
ante-chamber  all  this  while." 

On  another  occasion,  while  I  was  writing  my  notes 
in  Daudet's  company,  the  valet  brought  in  a  card.  It 
was  that  of  an  author  who  at  that  time  was  well  known 
in  Paris.  Daudet  told  the  valet  to  admit  him.  While 
the  two  men  were  talking  I  went  on  with  my  notes. 
They  conversed  in  whispers.  Daudet  was  sitting  at  his 
desk  facing  me,  the  visitor  was  bending  over  the  table 
speaking  into  his  ear.  After  a  while,  glancing  up,  I  saw 
a  strange  expression  on  Daudet's  face,  which,  as  I  watched 
it,  grew  more  and  more  marked.  At  last  he  caught  my 
eye.  I  understood  his  meaning,  and  I  got  up  and  rang 
the  bell.  The  valet  entered,  and  he  and  I  then  walked 
up  to  the  table  and  stood  close  by  the  visitor.  Daudet  said, 

"  Well,  my  dear ,  that  is  agreed  upon.     But  it  can't 

be  done  to-day,  because,  as  you  see,  I  have  a  visitor. 
To-morrow  we  will  talk  it  over  once  more."  The  man 
did  not  seem  satisfied,  but,  after  a  short  hesitation  he 
took  his  leave.     When  he  had  gone,  Daudet  said,   "  You 

have  witnessed  an  unusual  thing.     Poor went  mad 

before  your  eyes.  He  was  quite  sane  when  he  came 
into  the  room.  He  was  telling  me  something  quite 
rational.  After  a  while  he  began  to  talk  nonsense,  and 
in  the  end  sugforested  that  we  should  both  kill  ourselves 
hie  et  nunc,  in  order,  as  far  as  I  could  make  out,  to  enter 
upon  immediate  immortality.  I  am  glad  you  were  in  the 
room,  for  when  men  get  taken  that  way  there  is  no  saying 
what  they  may  do." 

During  my  absence  from  Paris,  after  all  my  notes  for 


4S8  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

My  First  W^yagc  had  been  taken,  alihough  the  business 
details  of  the  publication  of  the  book  caused  him  and  me, 
owino^  to  the  bad  faith  of  certain  people,  some  anxiety 
and  annoyance,  we  remained  in  friendly  correspondence. 
I  received  many  very  kind  and  precious  letters  from  him. 
One  of  his  letters  showed  him  in  the  light  of  a  good 
business  man.  It  was  one  he  wrote  me  after  some 
fresh  annoyance  had  been  caused  to  him  by  the  people  I 
refer  to.  He  added,  as  to  the  manuscript  which  I  was 
to  produce  from  the  notes  of  our  conversation,  "You 
remember  that,  as  we  found  that  the  incidents  which  I 
told  you  were  too  few  to  make  a  book,  you  were  to  write 
the  introductory  and  concluding  chapters.  However,  I 
shan't  worry  you.  You  are  quite  free  to  do  with  it  as 
you  think  fit.  I  must  remind  you,  however,  that  when 
I  rewrite  my  story  alone  in  French,  in  which  version  you 
will  be  left  out,  and  which  will  only  have  the  most  distant 
resemblance  to  the  English  narrative,  your  name  won't 
figure  on  the  book,  and  you  will  not  have  one  sou  to 
receive.  That  has  always  been  clearly  understood 
between  us.  A  votes  cordialement,  graitd  fou,  Alphonse 
Daudet." 

There  must  have  been  one  moment  when  the  annoy- 
ance caused  by  the  bad  faith  of  others  irritated  him  against 
me,  for  some  time  after  his  death,  picking  up  by  hazard 
one  of  the  volumes  which  were  published  after  his  death, 
and  in  writing  which  he  had  been  engaged  at  the  time  to 
which  I  refer,  I  came  across  a  few  lines  in  which  he  had 
sketched  my  portrait,  giving  certain  details  that  did  not 
allow  of  any  mistake  of  the  identity  of  the  character,  and 
I  could  see  that  at  the  moment  when  he  wrote  those  lines 
he  wanted  to  give  me  a  mild  chastisement.  However, 
the  mood  must  soon  have  passed. 

I  did  not  see  him  again  until  December  9,  1897,  when 


OUR    LAST    MEETING  489 

I  called  upon  him  in  his  new  house  in  the  Rue  de 
rUniversite.  It  was  a  magnificent  apartment  on  the  first 
floor,  and  the  windows  of  his  study  looked  out  on  one  of 
those  fine  private  parks  which  are  still  to  be  found  in  the 
Faubourg  St.  Germain.  He  was  very  happy  in  his  new 
home.  We  spent  a  long  and  memorable  hour  together. 
After  his  reference  to  Zola  and  the  absolute  indifference 
with  which  Zola's  Paris  and  his  own  SozUie^t  de  Fainille 
were  being  received,  he  went  on  to  speak  about  this  latter 
work.  He  said,  "  I  want  you  to  draw  as  wide  attention 
as  possible  to  the  fact  that  the  first  incidents  in  this  story 
of  mine  are  taken  from  life.  It  is  a  particular  service  I 
ask  of  you,  for  I  am  acting  here  in  the  role  of  a  justiciary. 
All  that  about  the  suicide  of  the  workman  because  he  was 
to  be  turned  out  of  his  house  for  non-payment  of  rent,  the 
distress  of  his  wife,  and  the  wretched  position  of  his  sons 
is  fact.  It  is  one  of  the  little  tragedies  of  Paris  which 
occurred  under  my  own  eyes.  The  landlord  of  the  house 
in  question  was  Faure,  now  President  of  the  Republic, 
but  at  that  time  Under-Secretary  of  State.  When  I 
had  heard  of  the  suicide  of  the  poor  man,  who  was  a 
humble  but  cherished  friend  of  mine,  I  took  the  two 
little  orphan  sons  of  his  by  the  hand  and  rushed  straight 
off  to  Faure's  house.  I  can  see  myself  now  standing  in 
his  hall,  with  the  two  lads  sobbing  bitterly,  clinging  to 
my  hands,  the  lackeys  looking  on  with  a  contemptuous 
stare.  I  had  sent  my  name  in  to  Faure,  and  had  been 
told  that  Monsieur  the  Under-Secretary  was  dining,  and 
could  not  be  disturbed.  I  said  that  nothing  would  drive 
me  from  where  we  stood  until  I  had  seen  him.  Presently 
Faure  came  out  through  one  of  the  doors  which  opened 
on  to  that  vestibule.  He  was  in  evening  dress,  and  carried 
his  napkin  in  his  hand.  I  presented  the  two  weeping  lads 
to  him,  and  I  told  him  that  his  harshness  had  made  them 


490  TWENTY  YEARS    IN    PARIS 

orphans.  He  expressed  great  distress  to  hear  of  the 
dreadful  thing  that  had  happened,  and  promised  that  he 
would  do  all  in  his  power  to  make  amends.  He  said  that 
he  was  in  ni^  way  to  blame  for  the  threats  which  had  been 
made  to  his  unfortunate  tenant,  that  all  that  had  been  done 
by  his  mother-in-law's  steward,  as  the  house  was  one  which 
that  lady  had  given  to  him  as  part  of  his  wife's  dowry — 
and  so  on.  I  warned  him  that  I  should  not  be  satisfied 
until  he  had  made  reparation  as  far  as  possible  for  what 
had  happened,  and  as  I  flung  out  of  the  house,  I  remember 
crying  out,  'The  writer  will  never  forget'  {Le  romancier 
71  outlier  a  jamais).  He  did  do  a  little  for  the  boys.  He 
recommended  them  for  scholarships  at  one  of  the  schools. 
But  that  cost  him  nothing,  and  it  was  not  sufficient 
reparation.  I  told  him  that  I  should  not  forget,  and  I 
am  now  keeping  my  promise.  And  I  want  you  to  help 
me  to  make  the  facts  known  as  widely  as  possible." 

We  then  talked  of  other  things.  I  never  found  him 
more  friendly,  displaying  a  kinder  interest  in  me.  He 
said  that  he  was  glad  to  hear  that  I  was  staying  at  the 
Hotel  Voltaire  on  the  Quai  Voltaire.  He  then  told  me 
that  as  soon  as  the  family  was  quite  settled  in  the  house, 
in  a  few  days,  I  must  come  and  dine  with  him.  "  Just 
wait  till  I  give  you  a  sign,"  he  said.  Then  he  handed 
me  the  sandalwood  box  which  always  stood  on  his  table, 
and  said,  "You  are  not  smoking;  take  a  cigarette."  I 
opened  the  box.  There  was  only  one  left.  "  Ought 
one  to  take  a  man's  last  cigarette  ? "  I  said,  and 
added,  "It  is  a  question  which  has  often  occupied  my 
mind."  While  I  was  saying  this  I  was  lighting  the 
papelito.  He  laughed  at  my  little  pleasantry  and  said, 
"  Question  and  answer  in  one  breath!  The  philosophers 
do  no  other  thing  than  that."  It  was  indeed  the  last 
cigarette. 


THE    STORY   OF   A   SHIRT  491 

When  I  had  returned  to  my  hotel  it  occurred  to  me 
that,  having  come  over  to  Paris  merely  for  the  purpose 
of  hard  work,  I  had  not  brought  with  me  a  dress  shirt 
suitable  to  wear  at  a  dinner  in  the  Faubourg  St.  Germain 
and  at  such  a  table.  That  same  afternoon  I  bought  one. 
It  was  procured  for  a  banquet  ;  it  served  for  a  funeral. 
No  man  more  than  Daudet,  in  whose  literary  tempera- 
ment was  the  Hans  Andersen  fibre  also,  would  have 
appreciated  the  cruel  irony  of  this  incident. 

A  week  later,  towards  seven  in  the  evening,  I  was 
returnino-  home  from  the  house  of  Professor  Richer  in  the 
Rue  de  I'Universite.  I  had  been  to  see  this  distinguished 
savant,  to  hear  from  him  some  particulars  about  a  new 
flying  machine  or  aeroplane  which  he  had  invented  and 
with  which  he  had  recently  been  experimenting  in  the 
South  of  France.  My  head  was  full  of  the  wonderful 
things  that  I  had  heard.  When  I  reached  the  Rue  du 
Bac,  my  way  home  would  have  taken  me  to  the  right  up 
this  street  and  so  to  Montmartre  over  the  bridge.  But 
I  found  myself  continuing  along  the  Rue  de  I'Universite. 
A  sudden  impulse  had  come  upon  me  to  go  on  to  No.  41, 
and  to  ask  to  see  Alphonse  Daudet.  It  was  an  unrea- 
sonable proposal.  The  hour  was  late.  He  had  himself 
told  me  at  our  last  meeting  to  wait  till  he  made  a  sign. 
But  I  went  on,  I  reached  No,  41.  I  took  hold  of  the 
bell-pull  of  the  house.  Then,  suddenly,  my  impulse  left 
me.  I  relaxed  my  grasp.  I  turned  round  on  my  heel 
and  walked  back  up  the  Rue  de  I'Universite,  reached  the 
Rue  du  Bac,  and  went  home.  Near  the  corner  of  the  Rue 
du  Bac  I  had  noticed  the  hour  by  a  clock  in  the  shop  of 
a  wine  dealer.  It  was  some  minutes  past  seven.  The 
next  morning  on  opening  my  Figaro  in  bed,  I  saw 
the  news  that  Alphonse  Daudet  was  dead.  From  what 
I  afterwards  learned  it  must  have  been  almost  at  the  very 


492  TWENTY   YEARS    IN    PARIS 

miiuite  tliat  1  had  my  hand  on  ihc  bell-pull  at  his  door 
that  he  fell  forward  dying  on  his  dining  table. 

Like  Zola,  his  old  friend  and  comrade-in-arms,  he  was 
standing  erect  when  the  blow  came  that  felled  him  to  the 
earth.  No  death  was  worthier  of  either  of  these  men. 
They  had  been  sturdy  and  valiant  fighters  all  their  lives, 
and  fighting  still  they  died  as  they  had  lived. 


INDEX 


Academy,  French,  317 
Adam,  Madame  Juliette,  375 

M       Paul,  393,  394 
Alexander,  King  of  Servia,  244 

„  Tzar,  238,  342 

Alfonso,  King  of  Spain,  1 1 
AUorto,  24,  229,  231 
Americain,  Caf6,  244 
Andernach,  Lords  of,  109 
Archer,  Francis,  118 
Aristophanes,  384 
Arsonval,  d',  Doctor,  197-200,  202-4 
Arton,  149 

Astor,  John  Jacob,  313,  314 
Aubert,  Joseph,  26  et  seq.,  173,  383 

,,        Madame,  280 
Aubertin,  220 
Augier,  Emile,  114 
Aumale,  Due  d',  135,  329 
Aurevilly,  Barbey  d',  458-60 

B 

Bacon,  261,  263,  329 
Balfour,  David,  374 
Ball,  Professor,  57 
Baltard,  106 

Balzac,  56,  91,  94,  459,  460 
Barnato,  Barney,  294 
Barr,  Robert,  180 
Barres,  Maurice,  393 
Barrymore,  Maurice,  330 
Bashkirtsheff,  Marie,  63 
Baudelaire,  Charles,  358 


Beaconsfield,  Lord,  347 
Beers,  Jan  van,  341 
Bel-Ami,  Original  of,  60 
Belgians,  Queen  of,  345 
Bell,  Sir  Lowthian,  171 
Belloc,  Hilaire,  1 14 

,,       Marie  Lowndes,  115 
Bernhardt,   Sarah,    53,    54,    116,   330, 

331,  332 
Besant,  Sir  Walter,  466 
Bibi-la-Puree,  32,  8r,  82,  385 
Bismarck,  107,  109,  no 
Blaine,  James  G.,  257,  259,  260-4,  30c 
Blake,  William,  232 
Blanche,  Doctor,  58,  64 
Blovvitz,  276,  319 
Boer,  de,  195 
Bois-Cervoise,  220,  221 
Bonaparte,  Princess  Pierre,  131 
„  Prince  Roland,  131 

Bonnemain,  Madame  de,  288 
Bonvin,  326,  327 
Boothby,  Guy,  ,181 
Bouguereau,  344 

Willy,  344 
Boulanger,    General,    108,    248,    254, 

256,  267,  268,  275,  277-80,   282, 

284-9,  311.  329 
Bourgeois,  L6on,  221 
Bourget,  Paul,  120,  376,  415 
B ovary,  Madajne ,'' ^^,  429 
Breck,  Alan  Stuart,  374 
Breteuil,  Marquis  de,  294 
Breton,  Courbevoie  murderer,  278 
Brillat-Savarin,  302 


493 


494 


INDEX 


Brisson,  276 
Bristol  Hotel,  294 
Brown-Scquard,  197,  19S,  202 
Brugt^re,  General,  265,  266 
BuUier,  Bal,  243 
Buloz,  119 


Canulias,  Dame  aux,  54 

Capbreton,  308 

Carlyle,  415,  43S 

Carnegie,  185 

Carnot,    23,  45,   223,   228,   237,    238, 

250,  251,  253,  256,  257,  258,  264, 

265-9,  284 
Carnot,  Madame,  191,  256,  258 
Caserio,  269 
Casimir-Perier,  270,  276 
Cassagnac,  G.  de,  273 

,,  Paul  de,  108,  369 

Cassation,  Court  of,  49 
Cassigneul,  360 
Castelin,  Andre,  280 
Cayenne,  Convict  settlement  at,  42 
Cazin,  327,  341 

Celsing,  Chamberlain  von,  247 
Chabanne,  Henri,  43 
Champion,  Honore,  119,  324 
Champsaur,  Felicien,  319 
Chatterton,  384 
Chaville,  in 
Ch6nais,  Madame,  2,  3 
Chesterfield,  Lord,  124 
Chevreul,  Eugene,  302 
Child,  Theodore,  319 
Chincholle,  287 
Christophle,  129,  141 
Cibber,  CoUey,  124 
Claretie,  Jules,  329 
Clarke,  Sir  Campbell,  319 
Cl6menceau,  Albert,  271 

350.  366 
Clementine,  Princess,  246 
Cleveland.  237 

Clinchamps,  Comtesse  de,  135 
Columbus,  144 


Connaught,  Duke  of,  342 

Consid(irant,  Victor,  379 

Constans,  288,  290-2 

Cook,  E.  T.,  318 

Copello,  Cavaliere,  178,  179,  183 

Copp6e,  Francois,  84,  87,  298,  323 

Coquelin,  aintf,  330,  340,  341 

„         cadet,   306,   324,   326,  327, 

331.  335 

„         Family,  The,  328 

,,         Madame,  327 
Cornu,  Maxime,  196 
Courvoisier,  32 
Crawford,  Marion,  386 
Criminal  Appeal,  Court  of,  48 
Cust,  H.,  318 


Datfy  Graphic,  The,  318,  467 
Dam6s,  33 
Danton,  285 
Darzens,  380,  381 

Daudet,  Alphonse,  4,  6,  27,   54,  118, 
120,  216,  217,  240,  377,  378,  388, 

414,  447.  473-5.  484-92 
Daudet,  Leon,  15 

,,        Madame  L6on,  376 
Daumier,  76 
Degas,  341 
Deibler,  24,  194,  195 
Delahaef,  33 
Depew,  Chauncey,  190 
De  Profundis,  417-23,  429 
Deroulede,  Paul,  114,  115 
Deschamps,  385 
Desmoulins,  Camille,  285 
Detaille,  341-3 
Devil's  Island,  The,  43 
Dodd,  Dr.,  351 

Donnelly,  Ignatius,  213,  261,  329 
Dowson,  Ernest,  397-412,  437 
Dieulafoy,  Madame,  376 
DostoTewski,  Fedor,  90 
Doughty,  Miss,  25 
Dreyfus,  Camille,  293 

Captain,  43,  440.  471-84 


INDEX 


495 


Drouet,  Madame  Juliette,  9 
Drumont,  369 

Dubois,  Marguerite,  32,  35,  42 
Dugnol,  Joseph,  186,  299,  301 
Dumas,  Alexandre,    14,   66,  78,  319, 

324,  325 
Dumas,  7^/5,  19,  52,  53,  70,  96,  388 
Dupoirrier,  456 
Duval,  234 


Ebner,  485 

Edison,  172,  174-6,  178-94 

„       Mrs.,  179,  183,  188,  191 
Eiffel,  129,  165,  166,  168-71,  173,  184, 

191 
Elizabeth,  Queen,  269 
Elys^e,  Palace,  45 
Epiphanes  Antiochus,  205 
Escoffier,  365 
Esterhazy,  270,  440,  441 
Eugenie,  Empress,  104,  no,  iii,  257 
Evvart,  Senator,  264 


Fairbairn,  171 

Fallieres,  258,  265,  266,  267 

Faure,  Felix,  46,  276,  277,  489 

Fenayrou,  L Affaire,  19,  51 

Fenine,  90,  92,  93,  95 

Ferry,  Jules,  220,  221,  267,  268,  287 

Feuillet,  Octave,  257 

Figaro,  Le,  98,  358,  364 

Flaubert,  55,  429 

Flers,  Marquis  de,  270,  271 

Floquet,  91,  284,  286,  287 

Fontainebleau,  45 

Forbes,  171 

Francis,  Don,  of  Spain,   1 1,  12,  240, 

241,  242 
Francois  ler.,  256 
Friant,  341 


Gambetta,  329 
Gamp,  Mrs.,  320 


Gavarni,  76 

Germany,  Emperor  of,  183 

Gervaise,  65 

Gide,  Andr6,  429,  432,  433,  441 

Girardin,  Emile  de,  325,  367 

Git-le-Cceur,  Rue,  117 

Gladstone,  189,  264 

„  Mrs.,  189 

Goethe,  105,  448 
Goncourt,  Edmond  de,  240 

,,         Jules  de,  240 
Gontaut-Biron,  Comtesse  de,  151 
Gounod,  338,  345 
Gourand,  Colonel,  178,  180,  188 
Grangey,  Baron  de,  271 
Grassal,  George.    See  Rebell,  Hugues 
"  Gratias,  Papa,"  45 
Grave,  Jean,  465 
Greece,  King  of,  88 
Grein,  467 
Gr6vy,    President,    16,    45,   135,   223, 

257,  258,  266,  268 
"  Grimm,  Thomas,"  365 
Gringoire,  82 
Groetzinger,  Madame,  50 
Grub,  Mr.  Bugg,  264 
Guizot,  212 
Guyot,  Yves,  366 

H 

Halevy,  Ludovic,  325 

Harland,  Henry,  118 

Harmsworth,  Sir  Alfred,  318 

Harris,  Phoebe,  372 

Hartmann,  57 

Haussmann,  Baron,  102-4,   108,   in, 

1 13-6 
Hauteville  House,  i,  2,  3 
Havard,  106 
Haweis,  212 

Hearst,  W.  T.,  476,  480,  483 
Hedin  Sven,  304 
Henner,  344 
Henri  III.,  418 
Her^dia,  De,  394 
Hdrisson,  Comte  d',  272 


4o6 


INDEX 


Her/,  Cornelius,  149 
Hirsch,  Baron,  294 
Hoffmann,  Louis  von,  293 
Houssaye,  Arsene,  68 
Hugo,  Jeanne,  10,  15,  376 

,,       Sigisbert,  13 

„      Victor,  I,  2  et  seq.,  16,  47,  52, 
So,  362 
Hugues,  Madame  Clovis,  18 

I 

Ibsen.  58,  247 
Irving,  Sir  Henry,  339,  340 
Isabella,  Queen,  240 
Izycki,  Wladislas,  86,  87,  89 

J 

Johnson,  Dr.  Samuel,  47,  124 
Joseph.     See  Dugnol,  Joseph 

,,         Boulanger's  page-boy,  279, 

281 
Joseph-Renaud,  327,  392,  441 
Joubert,  195,  196 
Jourdain,  Coupe-Tete,  276 
Journal,  Le,  References  to,  42 
Jouy,  Jules.  226,  227,  230,  232 

K 

Karr,  Alphonse,  78 
Keats,  63,  308 
Kemmler,  194-6,  202 
Kennedy,  Bart,  223 
Kessler,  Count,  131,  132 

Countess,  132,  352 
Kidgerbury,  Mrs.,  242 
King  Edward  VII.,  342 
Kock,  Paul  de,  14 
Krupp,  189 


Lacenaire,  32 

La  Chesnaye,  146,  163 

Lacoste,  Mother,  309 

La  Jeunesse,  Ernest,  43^-44.  459 


Launcey,  Provost  de.  357 

Laurent,  Charles,  366 

Lazare,  Bernard,  43 

Leclerc,  R6n6,  27,  358,  383,  384 

Le  Clere,  Victor,  214 

Lef6bvre,  Madame,  255 

Leipsic,  1 1 1 

Lemaitre,  335 

Leopold.  King,  of  Belgium,  245 

Leroux,  Hugues,  484 

Lespes,  Leo,  365 

Lesseps,  Charles  de,   137.    143,    151, 

152,  153,  158,  162 
Lesseps,  Ferdinand  de,  121-65,216,  354 

„         Guiselle  de,  152,  159 

„         Helene  de,  158,  159,  160,  163 

,,  Ismail  de,  139,  151 

,,         Lolo  de,  151,  159 

,,         Madame  de,   134,    137,   138, 
140,  141,  147-51.  153.  158,  160-3 
Lesseps,  Matthew  de,  151,  153 

„         Paul  de,  151,  159 

,,         Robert  de,  159 

,,         Solange  de,  159 

„         Zi-Zi  de,  151,  152,  153,  159 
Lichtenstein,  Colonel,  265 
Lienard,  Marguerite,  75-7 
Li-Hung-Tchang,  304 
Lisbonne,  Maxime,  225,  226 
Liszt,  336 

Lockroy,  Madame,  52 
Logerot,  General,  258,  267,  268 
Lombroso,  27,  30 
Loti,  Pierre,  376 

Loubet,  President,  18,  46,  51,  258,  267 
Louis,  Doctor,  396 

„       XL,  82 

M       XIV.,  329 
„       XVI.,  276 

,,      Philippe,  76 
Louys,  Pierre,  393,  394,  395,  396 
Luffey,  alias  Luftus  Riley,  292 

]M 

Macdonnell,  J.  de  Courcy,  245 
Mackay,  Mrs.,  352 


INDEX 


497 


■McLane,  260 

MacMahoti,    Marshal,   248,   249,   250, 

257,  277 
Madeleine,  Jacques,  380,  381 
Maeterlinck,  Maurice,  323 
Magnard,  Editor  oi  Le  Figaro,  131-3, 

363.  364.  371.  469 
Mahaffy,  212 
Malet,  Sir  Edward,  130 
Mallarme,  Stephane,  387,  390,  391 
JVIaquet,  Auguste,  324,  325 
Marchesi,  Madame,  345 
Marie,  Adrien,  250,  252,  254,  255 
Marie-Antoinette,  240 
Marinoni,  361 

,,         Madame,  361 
Markets,  Central,  106 
Marlowe,  118,  262 
Martyrs,  Cafe  des,  355 
Massenet,  Jules,  336-8 
Mathilde,  Princesse,  297 
Matthews,  Charles,  223 
Maupassant,   Guy  de,   14,   55-60,  67, 

157,  216,  228 
Mazarin,  214 

Medicis,  Catherine  de,  135 
Meissonier,  352 
Melba,  132,  345,  346 
Mendes,  Catulle,  380 
,,         Raphael,  381 
Meredith,  George,  459 
Mermeix-Terrail,  367 
Merrill,  Stuart,  392 
Metternich,  67 

„  Madame  de,  iio,  1 11 

Meyer,  Arthur,  254,  255,  352 
Michel,    Louise,    218,  222,  224,   227, 

231,  232 
Michelet,  Quotation  from,  Note  to,  348 
Mikhael,  Ephraim,  380 
Milan,  of  Servia,  243 
Mimaut,  Mile.,  151 
Miracles,  Cour  des,  loo 
Moliere,  268,  276,  329 
Montepin,  Xavier  de,  360 
Moore,  George,  470,  471 
Mor6as,  Jean,  379,  380,  390,  392,  394 


Mores,    Marquis   de,    288,    290,   293, 

294,  381 
Mores,  Marquise  de,  293 
Morin,  18 
Mounet,  Paul,  340 

Sully,  339,  340 
Morton,  Mr.,  260 
Mun,  Comte  de,  294 
Munkaczy,  341 
Murat,  Prince,  296,  297,  298 

,,      Princess,  297 
Murger,  Henry,  378,  383 
Musset,  Alfred  de,  112 

N 

Napoleon  I.,  6,  249,  272,  460 

,,  III.,  13,  103,  104,  106,  109, 

III,  241,  257 

Natalie,  Queen,  244 

Nemours,  Due  de,  74 

Nerval,  Gerard  de,  115,  120 

New  York  Herald,  The,  312 

New  York  Times,  The,  335 

Ney,  Marshal,  297 

Nittis  de,  69,  341 

Notre  Datne  de  Paris,  Hugo's,  4 

O 

Ohnet,  George,  335,  336 
Oliphant,  Laurence,  389 
Orleans,  Due  d',  1 12 

,,         Prince  Henri  d',  270,  271 
Oscar,  King  of  Sweden,  247 
Ouida,  87 


Pailleron,  Maxime,  119 

Pall  Mall  Gazette,  The,  318,  467 

Palmerston,  264 

Pasteur,  266 

Pearl,  Cora,  232-4 

Pedro,  Dom,  140,  242 

Pelouze,  Madame,  135 

Pene,  Henri  de,  368 

Peters,  W.  T.,  392 

32 


49i> 


INDEX 


Petit  Journal,  I.g,  361 
Pierre,  Father,  152 
Pizarros,  The,  341 
Poe,  Kdgar  AMan,  382 
Poictiers,  Diane  de.  135 
Poiiicar^,  351 
Ponchuii,  Kai)ul,  393 
Porter,  General  Horace,  341 
Prado,  1 8 

Prince,  a  prisoner,  428 
Prinet,  162 
Pulitzer,  Albert,  243 

Joseph,  249,  306 


Queensberry,  Marquis  of,  301 
Quincey,  De,  29 

R 

Racine,  94 
Raffaeli,  76 
Ranc,  367 
Rattazzi,  178 
Reade,  Charles,  212 
Rebell,  Hugues,  63,  386-90 
R^gnier,  Henri  de,  393,  394,  396 
Reichemberg,  Mile.,  329 
Reid,  VVhitelaw,  264 
Reinach,  Baron  de,  149 

,,         Joseph,  268,  369 
Renan,  154,  156,  204,  207,  211-6,  218, 

388 
Ressmann,  161 
Richaud,  290 
Richebourg,  Emile,  361 
Richepin,  53,  54 
Richer,  Professor,  491 
Ritt.  345 

Robert,  Henri,  20,  26 
Robespierre,  285 
Rochefort,   Henri,  75.   114,  218,   221, 

267,  268,  356,  369,  370 
Rochefoucauld,  178 
Rollinat,  118,  382,  398 
Roosevelt,  President,  192 
Roquette,  La,  47 


Rothschild,  Nathan  de,  Baronne,  326 
Rougon-Macepiarts,  The,  119 
Round  the  World  in  Eighty  Days,  314 
Rudolph,  Prince,  345 


Sadoua,  1 10 

Sainte-Croix,  C.  de,  356 

St.  Simon,  276 

Salis,  Abbe,  81 

Sandringham,  Music  mistress  at,  307 

Sardou,  Victorien,  53,  330 

Saussier,  General,  134 

Schinderhannes,  194 

Schneider,  Hortense,  78,  241 

„  Minister,  241 

Scholl,  Aur6lien,  325,  362,  37 1 ,  374, 375, 
Schopenhauer,  57-9 
Schwob,  Marcel,  386 
Sellier,  24,  229 
S6nat,  Hugo's  dog,  2,  3 
Serrcs  Chaudes  Les,  323 
Severine,  Mme.,  35 
Sevigne,  Marquise  de,  120 
Shakespeare,  261 
Siemens,  Dr.,  189 
Sienkiewicz,  H.,  90 
Singh,  Prince  Dhuleep,  252 
Socrates,  384 
Sorel,  Agnes,  147,  161 
Stanhope,  245 
Stead,  W.  T.,  318,  467 
Stevens,  341 

Stevenson,  R.  L.,  374,  386,  387 
Strong,  Rowland,  440,  441 
Sue,  Eugene,  362 
Sweden,  King  of,  247,  248,  Note  to,. 

452 
Sweden,   Queen  of,  246,  247 
Swinburne,  9,  56 
Sylvain,  Caf6,  243 


Tacitus,  209 
Tailhade,  Laurent,  386 
Taine,  Hippolyte,  7,  8,  66,  67 


INDEX 


499 


Talleyrand,  67 

Tcheng-Ki-Tong,  303,  304 

Temps  ^  Le,  112 

Terre,  La,  22 

Thackeray,  363 

Thibaud,  Anatole,  119 

Thiers,  M.,  85,  113,  350 

Thurtell,  32 

Tichborne  Case,  81 

Tirard,  191,  269 

Tissandier,  381 

Tout-Paris,  Le,  100 

Trans-Siberian  Railway,  315 

Travailleurs  de  la  Met;  Les,  4,  5 

"  Trimm,  Timothy,"  365 

Trois  Moiisqiietaires,  Les,  324,  325 

Turner,  326 

U 

Ungern-Sternberg,  Isabelle,  Baroness 

of,  Note  to,  420 
Uzes,  Duchess  d',  253,  254,  367 


Vacquerie,  Auguste,  3,  8-12,  369,  370 

Valentin-le-Desosse,  303 

Vanderbilt,  W.  K.,  299-301,  343 

Varrila,  Bunaud,  134 

Veau  Qui  Tette,  Le,  Tavern  of,  115 

Verlaine,  82-4,  383-5 

Verne,  Jules,  67,  314-6 

,,       Michel,  316 
Versailles,  Jury  of,  51 
Vicomte  de  Bragelonne,  Le,  324 
Victoria,  Queen,  10,  161,  233,  252 
Vieille  Lanterne,  Rue  de  la,  115 


Villemessant,  De,  98,  358,  363,  364 
Villon,  81,  82 
Vizetelly,  466,  467,  471 
Volders,  Jean,  245 
Voltaire,  82 

Waldeck-Rousseau,  276 

Wales,  Prince  of,  75 

Watkin,  Sir  Edward,  171,  172 

Weare,  William,  32 

Westinghouse,  184 

Westmitister  Gazette,  The,  318 

Whistler,  327,  346-9 

Whiteing,  Richard,  319 

Whitney,  Secretary,  264 

Wilde,   Oscar,  9,    10,   346,   347,   382, 

386,  390,  392,  412-64,  466 
William,  Emperor,  238,  299,  300 
Williams,  Commissioner,  192 
Wilson,  Daniel,  135,  136,  223 
Winter,  o{X\\&New  York  Tribune,  340 
Wolff,  352,  365 
Wordsworth,  105,  380 

X 

Xau,  Fernand,  371,  469 


Yellow  Journalism,  The,  308 


Zola,  4,  7,  22,  32,  56,  68,  119,  217, 
234,  270,  311,  350,  364,  371,  374, 
414,  463-92 


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1861- 
Twenty  years  in  Paris; 


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